


Two Things

by E_J_Frost



Series: Mechanical Bull [2]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Aftercare, Anal Sex, Angst, BDSM, Dom/sub, Double Penetration, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Past Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-26
Updated: 2017-08-26
Packaged: 2018-12-20 04:01:55
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 24,168
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11912799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/E_J_Frost/pseuds/E_J_Frost
Summary: This story contains references to a non-consensual branding and drug use. Please do not read if these issues disturb you.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This story contains references to a non-consensual branding and drug use. Please do not read if these issues disturb you.

Football.

I hate football. I hate all kinds of professional sports. God, they’re boring.

But now I’m lying on Bull’s couch with my eyes glued to the game. I’m barely even blinking, I’m so engrossed.

“What’s happenin’ now?” he murmurs. The vibration of his voice makes me quiver.

“Everyone’s in the middle. The guys in yellow . . . passing the ball back and forth.”

“Argo-Brazel. Fuckin’ technicians.” His voice is muffled and each word, the motion of his mouth against my flesh, makes me clutch at his head in ecstatic frenzy.

He loosens my hands with a chuckle and continues the slow stroking of his tongue over my clitoris. His fingers kneed my ass in synch with his repetitive movement.

My eyes roll back in my head. What he’s doing feels so good. My orgasm’s so close my legs shake with it.

“Ker, what’s happenin’?”

I blink, try to focus. My orgasm recedes. As he intended. He’s held me this way for forty-four minutes, fifteen seconds. The entire first half of the damn game. If they don’t break for half-time soon, I’m going to implode.

“Ker?” He lifts his head slightly, blows cool air across my labia. It tingles like the touch of an ice-cube.

“The guy with purple hair just kicked the ball at the goal but he missed.” A whistle blows, loud through the cylindrical silver speakers flanking the holoscreen. “Thank God! Do me! You promised!”

Bull chuckles and kisses my mons. He brushes his teeth against the nub of my clitoris, so swollen that it protrudes between my labia. A playful bite nearly sends me over the back of the couch. “Bull!”

He sits up, wiping his mouth. “You know, I been thinkin’.”

“About what?” It better be about how to give me the orgasm I deserve after forty-five minutes of torture.

He pushes my legs aside and sits next to me. Where’s he going? Worry begins to work through my flaming arousal.

“It’s half-time,” I say, striving for calm. He wouldn’t really leave me like this. “You’ve got nothing to do for twenty minutes.” That’s the extent of my knowledge of football. All I know is that for the next twenty minutes, there’s no game.

“Yeah, but I’ll miss the first half analysis. An’ I might get too wrapped up in it to watch th’ second half.”

“Bull!”

He laughs, flashing his white teeth, and draws me into his lap. “C’mere, Kerey. Ride me, baby.”

I clamour onto his thighs, not caring about grace or cool or anything else.

He’s ready for me. His second cock glistens as I position myself over him. He’s already put a condom on. That earns him a deep kiss as I grasp his shoulders for leverage and lower myself onto him. I’m so wet that I could probably get him where I want him without help. But sex with Bull’s not like that. He’s always in control. I’m the one who’s constantly on the verge of losing it, flying apart. His hands on my slippery thighs guide me, steady my descent. His two heads nudge against me, push into flesh that yields readily, achingly. His cocks feel cool, I’m so hot inside. My vagina and ass clench, trying to pull him inside me and come. I want to come so bad I’d do anything for it in this moment. He pushes a little way inside me. My head snaps back of its own accord, breaking our kiss. A drawn-out moan rattles up through my throat. Bull bites at my neck, teasing the vibrating flesh, making my skin tingle.

“Slow down, Ker,” he whispers into my ear. The vibrations of that deep baritone shimmy through the sensitive structures inside my ear, down my throat, spreading through each nerve. “Wait for it, baby.”

I can’t. I can’t obey. I can’t do anything to prolong my release. I try to force myself down on him. “Just fuck me!” I cry.

He chuckles and his hand tightens on my ass, holding me suspended above him effortlessly. “We’ll get there.”

I clutch at his shoulders like a life-line. I’m going to implode, disappear into the black hole of my own need, if I don’t come soon. “Bull,” I moan. “Please, please let me come.”

“Mmm, you beggin’?”

Anything, _anything_ , to have him all the way inside me. “Yes, God . . . Bull, please, I’m begging.”

“Okay, baby.” He pushes upwards with his hips, down with his hand, shoving himself into me. I throw my head back and scream. The double penetration feels so good, so right. My whole body incandesces, the orgasm firing through my nerve-endings like a galaxy exploding.

Bull holds me tight against him, pumping a little against my contractions, drawing out my orgasm. When I collapse, shuddering, against him, he pushes my hair back from my face and smiles at me. His eyes, hooded and glittering with sex, make my heartbeat accelerate all over again.

“That was a pretty good one,” he says, pursing his lips as though he’s contemplating a fine brand of beer.

“Uh-huh.” I feel lobotomized by the strength of my climax.

“But you ain’t done yet.”

I moan. The second time is always more intense. So intense it often leaves me weeping; sometimes it leaves me unconscious.

“Move a little. We’ll go slow.”

I try to pull myself together. He rocks his hips under me, setting the slow pace he promised, and as I regain control of my limbs, I begin to move with him. The slow motion slides his two hard cocks deliciously inside me. The friction of them, rubbing everything, everywhere, is astounding. Each time we fuck, it’s freshly amazing. With each thrust, the pleasure builds again. Bull groans and clasps me tight. His arms are so big, so hard against my back and sides. My skin, sweat-slick, melts into his.

“Talk to me, Ker,” he whispers, hot and rough.

I lift my mouth to his ear, lick the lobe, try to think of something to say. We’re still working on this part. And sometimes it doesn’t come easy. Today, though, I have something to talk about.

“I loved having your mouth on me,” I say, as soft and husky as I can. “It made me crazy, having you do that and not let me come. Like there was nothing you’d rather be doing. Even better than watching the game—”

That draws a groaning chuckle out of him. The pace of his hips, pumping up against mine, increases. He moves a little faster, a little harder, and my eyes roll back in my head with how good it feels.

“—and I loved having your tongue inside me. Almost as good what’s in me right now.”

He shudders. His hips piston up into me. He strokes so deep, it feels like he’s caressing my heart.

“God, yes, Bull.”

His body trembles violently under mine. Muscles leap, pulling taut under that smooth golden skin. His thick neck flexes against my arms as his head goes back. His lips peel back from his teeth. Seeing his pleasure, feeling him go inside me, brings me again, a sweet, deep orgasm. Right down inside me where he’s buried himself. Wave on wave on wave spreading out from my core.

I collapse on him, my eyes closed, my mind already drifting. He cuddles me against him, rocking back and forth. Each breath hums deep in his throat. He loves this part. The afterglow. I’m learning to enjoy it. To glory in the sensations, even the icky, sweaty, gooey sensations, the way he does. But mostly I like having him hold me afterwards while I fall into an exhausted sleep against his shoulder.

*

A deep rumble under my ear drags me back to groggy consciousness.

“Thought I told you to call first.”

“I was running late.” A high whine. “I didn’t want to miss the whole second half.”

“Next time, _call_.”

“That better not be Jello,” I murmur into the warm skin under my cheek. I’m too blissed to open my eyes and find out. “What time is it?”

“Two minutes into second half.”

A creak of leather from the other couch. Bull grunts. “Jello, use your fuckin’ eyes.”

“Whaaat? I am. Man, Kerey, your ass is the fucking-.”

“Jello!” I groan.

“Shut your eyes!” Bull roars. “Don’t look!”

I have to giggle.

“Aww, I’m missing the game,” Jello whines.

“I’m gonna tear you a new one,” Bull grumbles. “Hold on, Ker.”

His hand closes on my ass, pinning me against him. With a heave and an exhalation of leather, he rises off the couch. I wrap my legs around his waist. Pins and needles erupt from my toes to my knees. Ouch ouch ouch. I’ve been asleep on him for too long.

Easily, as though I weigh nothing, Bull carries me across the room to the bed. He sets me on the edge and, holding my hips, withdraws from me carefully. We both grimace. We’re glued together. Our skins part with a gooey snap.

“That sounded painful over here,” Jello says from the couch

He really needs to shut up. “Can I borrow your shirt?” I ask Bull.

“Yeah. Why?” He glances at the rack of my clothes hanging on the far side of the bed. I haven’t needed to borrow his clothes since my things arrived, forwarded from the apartment I gave up. For him.

“I want to gag him with it.”

Bull chuckles. “Lemme.” He scoops a dirty t-shirt off the floor, wads it up and fires it at the back of Jello’s corn-rowed head. The shirt neatly swallows Jello’s head and shoulders.

“Ow.” The whine is muffled. “Hey, this stinks. What’ve you been doing in this thing? Pee-fucking-eww.”

Bull and I exchange grins as we dress.

When I reach for my boots, Bull’s eyes narrow and he asks, “You goin’ out?”

I nod carefully. Still a sore point. “Just for a little while. Cee is pulling together those receipts so I can finish up her accounts tonight. Their extension runs out on Monday.”

Bull rubs a finger across his mouth. “Yeah, okay,” he says finally. Then he adds, as an afterthought, in a grunt, “They’re grateful, you know. Lou said she didn’t know what they’d’ve done without you.”

“Six months in the cubes for tax evasion.” I smile broadly, both at the compliment and at Bull’s expression when I pick up his beloved leather jacket and slip into it. I cuddle it around me. It feels like slipping into his skin. “Maybe they’ll actually pay me.”

Bull’s frown deepens, turns real. “Hef’s gonna pay you. He’s just a little stretched right now. An’ what do you need payin’ for? Thought we talked about that.”

I nod. We did. He talked. I disagreed. I need a job, for my sanity, and self-respect. And I need my own money, for the same reasons. But resurrecting that argument when I’m about to go out would be particularly idiotic. Even for me. “Just kidding,” I say lightly.

We both know I wasn’t, but we both shy away from precipitating another argument. He wraps his long fingers around the lapels of the jacket and pulls me to him. Tight against that hard chest and stomach. I lift my face to his and kiss him back when he leans down to fit his mouth to mine. After just a few seconds of kissing, we’re locked together like we haven’t just been fucking for hours. I can feel myself getting hot and achy again. God, I could melt into this man.

He finally comes up for air and smiles into my wanting eyes. His hand snakes up to cup the back of my head and tilt it forward. He plants a soft, wet kiss on my forehead. His hand feathers through my hair, fluffing it around the jacket’s wide shoulders. “Jello’s right about one thing,” he whispers into my skin.

“What’s that?” I turn my face so I can nip at the firm line of his jaw.

“Your ass is the fucking end.” At my giggle, he sighs. “Lettin’ you go gets harder each time.”

My heart trips. The hurt’s still there. Even a week later. He still doubts. It’s my own fault. I shouldn’t have gone out and gotten lost. Shouldn’t have gone out without a pocket navigator. Shouldn’t have gone out at all. Not when we were still figuring things out. When he was still uncertain about the permanence of my decision. When he was still waking up in the early morning hours calling my name and reaching for me like he didn’t expect me to be there. But four days of staring at the walls with nothing to do while he worked made me less than sane.

I look directly into those liquid dark eyes. “Want me to pick up something _on my way back_?”

“Yeah. Lemon chicken.”

He grins. I return it. And the hurt vanishes under the shared memory of the first time he asked me if I wanted to try ‘lemon chicken’ and I thought it was a new sex position and started to go down on him as he was picking up the vcom to order take-out.

I stretch up on my toes and plant an open-mouthed kiss on his lips. “See you in about an hour. Game’ll be over by then, right?”

Bull glances at the holo, as though for confirmation, even though I’m sure he knows to the second where the game is. “Yeah.”

“And Jello will be . . .?” Gone, I hope. Because Bull opens the club at nine and I would really, really like to be alone with him again before then.

Bull scrubs his hand across his scalp. “Probably not. Better get him sweet and sour.”

Resigning myself to dinner with Jello, and to waiting until later for more sex, I nod, give Bull another quick kiss and make my way between the rows of exercise equipment to the lift.

When I climb in and turn to pull down the grates, I see Bull still standing near the bed, watching me go. God, the darkness in his eyes. I almost start back to reassure him. But then I make myself pull down the grate, work the lift controls. I can’t be a pet. House-bound. A waiting slave. And Bull doesn’t want me to be. It’s just bad luck, and my own stupidity, that’s made him doubt.

He’ll get over it. Won’t he?

*

Cecile greets me at the bar’s back door. The Leatherette’s not a place I can go in by myself. Not without attracting the wrong sort of attention from the leather dykes that have staked out the bar as their personal turf. I skirt around a long row of shiny two-wheelers parked in the alley behind the bar and slide through the back door into the Leatherette’s small office.

Cecile kisses me on each cheek. “Thanks for coming over, hon. Jewel’s out sick, so we’re understaffed. Again.”

I nod. Being with Bull, spending time with his friends, most of whom are owners of the bars and clubs in the six blocks around Barzarre that make up the Zone, has given me an appreciation for the difficulties of running the places I used to see just as pick-up joints.

“You want a coffee or something?” she asks.

That means Cee wants to talk. I’ve only known her for a little over a week, but I’ve already started to recognize her subtexts.

“Sure.”

The office door admits a blast of noise and smoke from the front of the bar as she slips through to get the coffees. It’s, what, six thirty? They really have started early tonight.

I settle into the office’s broken-down couch to wait. Cecile returns a moment later, accompanied by another blast of noise and smoke. She hands me a steaming mug and curls up cross-legged next to me on the couch.

“Sounds like it’s already in full roar.” I nod toward the front.

Cecile rolls her eyes. “Must feel like spring or something. Everyone’s in heat. One of our regulars started pounding on the door at quarter of five. She knows we can’t open that early. Lou gave her a beer to keep her from ripping the door off its hinges. She was convinced the femmes were already in here, putting their faces on or something. I tell you.”

I laugh and sip my coffee. It’s so good I shiver. Cecile’s coffee was the first thing I liked about her. Anyone who makes coffee this good is one of God’s gifts to this messed-up world.

“You and Bull definitely coming out tonight?” she asks.

“Definitely.” I’ve been looking forward to it all day. Sunday night all the neighborhood bar staff close at midnight and get together at one of the late-night places. Unwind after the weekend. Swap war-stories. Last week was my initiation into this close group of Bull’s friends and co-workers. He took me while we were both still steaming from the argument that followed me getting lost. Despite the tension between us, I enjoyed the night. I’d already met Cecile; she and her partner, Louise, made me feel welcome. Like part of the group.

I can’t remember the last time I felt like part of a group.

“Just remind Bull that it’s at the Cage tonight.”

“The Cage, okay.” I haven’t been there before, but Bull’s mentioned it. It’s a strip club on the edge of the Zone that stays open until dawn.

Cecile gives me a long look from under her blonde dreadlocks. Then she tosses them back and says, “Do you think that new tart from ‘Vinyl and Lace’ will be there?”

I shrug. I didn’t get a chance to speak with anyone from the other leather dyke bar in the Zone last week. Although I remember Lou talking with a girl in the bar’s signature red vinyl catsuit for a while.

Cecile turns the coffee mug around between her palms. “’Cause I think Lou might be having an affair with her.”

I choke on a sip of coffee. “Are you serious?”

At Cecile’s expression, I backpedal. She’s very serious. “What makes you think that?”

She sighs. “You just know, don’t you? Little things. The way she’s acting.”

“Ignoring you?” I’ve never had anyone cheat on me. I’ve never stuck around long enough for it to become a possibility. I have no idea how I’d know if Bull was. If he didn’t want to fuck me about ten times a day, I suppose I’d begin to wonder.

“No, just the opposite. All over me. She gave me flowers yesterday. I can’t remember the last time she gave me flowers.”

“Aww, Cee, that’s sweet.” Bull hasn’t given me flowers.

“Grow a brain, girly-girl. Men give you flowers when they’re feeling guilty.”

I don’t point out that Lou’s a woman. It’s taken me a little while, but I’m getting used to Cecile referring to her partner as male. It’s a femme thing, I guess.

“Or maybe just to show you that they love you. I’ve never seen anyone as crazy about anyone as Lou is about you. Everybody can see that.”

Cecile snorts. “Have you looked in the mirror lately?”

I shrug self-consciously. I don’t know what to say. Bull wants me to be demonstrative with him in public, so I am. Does that mean I’m as crazy about him as Lou is about Cecile? Or that he is about me? I don’t know. I’ve got no experience with _relationships_. Even when I was with Viv and Jere, it was very much a sex-every-other-weekend thing. I didn’t let it consume any more of me than that. And now that I’ve let this thing with Bull become all-consuming, I have no idea what the contours of it are.

“Lou went over to Vinyl and Lace twice this week. ‘Man talk,’ she said. But I think it was to screw that tart.”

I tap my nails against the sides of the coffee-cup. “Does Lou go over there often? Because Bull’s always coming over here or going down the street to Nexus and it doesn’t mean anything . . .” Realizing how hopelessly stupid that sounds, I correct myself. “I don’t think it means anything.”

Cecile giggles. “You’re right about that. I’m surprised Bull can tear himself away from you long enough to walk down the street.” She fluffs her dreadlocks, fanning the back of her neck. “It’s different when you’ve been together for a while.”

“How long have you been with Lou?”

“Going on five years.” She smiles and her grey-blue eyes go misty. “We were like you and Bull at the beginning. Couldn’t keep our hands off each other. We spent whole days in the sack. But, you know, it fades.” Her smile twists, turns false and brave.

I try to laugh it away. “Of course it does. No one could feel this intensely about someone else all the time and survive.”

“No?” Cecile takes a sip of coffee and looks at me over the rim. There’s sadness in her eyes that has nothing to do with Lou’s imagined affair. “How long do you think it will last, Kerey?”

Taken aback, I work my mouth silently for a moment, shaping different answers. “Uh, I don’t know . . . are we talking about you and Lou or me and Bull?”

“Both.”

“I, uh, I dunnow. Look, you and Lou are great, Cee. You’re the closest couple I’ve ever seen. You know how Bull introduced you two to me? He said, ‘here’s the happy ending.’ I mean, what does that say?”

Cecile raises an eyebrow and takes another sip of coffee. “It says Bull hasn’t been with anyone for a long time. He’s forgotten how much hard work it can be.”

I wince. Bull’s friends, to a one, blame me for Bull’s long dry run. Even though I had no idea he was anything more than casually interested in me. And they’ve all, pointedly or more subtly, questioned how long I’m sticking around.

Cecile stretches, sighs. “Sorry, hon. I didn’t mean that the way it sounded. Or to unload all over you.”

“No, no.” I wave her apology away. Despite the uncomfortable moments, I like talking with Cecile. It’s like having a real girl friend. One who knows how I spend my nights and doesn’t think any less of me. “None of you think I’m staying, do you?”

Cecile has the grace to look embarrassed. “Have we made it that obvious?”

“Yeah. But I guess you’ve got good reason.” I trace the rim of my cup with one finger. “It hasn’t all been one-sided, you know. I haven’t exactly had good luck with my doms.”

“One dead, one locked up. That’s an understatement.”

I blink at Cecile. Viv’s doing a two-year sentence for what she did to me, but . . . “Who’s dead?”

Cecile puts her fingers over her mouth in a gesture that would be comic if this conversation hadn’t taken such an awful turn. “I thought you knew,” she breathes.

“ _Who_ is dead?” I repeat.

“Marcus. Over a year ago. Fuck me, Kerey, I thought you knew. I never, ever would have . . .”

I make an attempt to wave her apology away, but cover my eyes with my hand instead. Marcus. Poor Marcus. “Did he OD?”

Her dreadlocks swish and I look up to finding her nodding. She looks genuinely horrified. And sympathetic.

It’s my turn to smile bravely. “I’m not surprised. He was headed that way when I knew him.” I wipe my eyes. Just a touch of excess moisture. “Poor guy.”

The door to the bar snicks open, the sudden noise making both of us jump. Lou’s close-cropped head pokes around the corner. “Cee, what’re you doing back here? I need eight goddamn arms to keep up . . . oh, hey, Kerey.”

“Hi, Lou. Sorry, I didn’t mean to keep her.”

“That’s okay.” Lou flaps a thick hand. “You gals have your chat. You’re coming out with us later, right?”

I nod, smile. “Wouldn’t miss it.”

“Good.” Lou withdraws, taking the noise with her.

“Love calls,” Cecile says wryly. She takes my empty coffee cup and hands me a carrier bag. We both rise and she accompanies me to the back door.

I pause there. “For what it’s worth, Cee, I _am_ staying. And I think you’re wrong about Lou. I hope so anyway.”

She kisses me on each cheek. “Me, too, hon. See you later.”

She cycles open the door for me and I step out into the alley, to carefully retrace my steps to Barzarre.

*

When I return, laden with the carrier of receipts and another carrier of Spice City’s fragrant-smelling parcels, Bull’s sitting on the couch with his back to the lift. The holo’s dark. I don’t see Jello anywhere. Unless he’s behind the white screen that Bull put up around the toilet after I moved in. I check; no legs under the hanging screen. Guess he decided not to stick around for sweet and sour.

Which means more sex for me before Bull goes to work.

“I’m back,” I announce, pulling the lift doors closed behind me. “Who won?”

Bull stands and tosses something onto the glass table between the couches. He doesn’t turn around. Under his black t-shirt, his shoulders hunch.

“Message for you,” he says. He moves off towards the cluster of kitchen appliances, standing like white sentinels among the sleek chrome and black exercise machines that surround them. He still doesn’t turn around, doesn’t look at me. I start forward, curiously. “Angela.”

My work name. My ‘straight’ name. Bull’s use of it makes me drop the bags I’m holding.

“Wha-what?”

Bull tips his head at the holo. I walk quickly into the circle of couches facing the holo viewer and pick up the control wand that Bull’s left on the table. It’s still warm from his hand.

I tap in the playback sequence. The holo blinks and then a face fills the display.

I know that face. Piers D. Le Vasseur. The Third. M.B.A.F. Veep of Compliance and Audit. My old boss.

I didn’t expect to see that face again, though. Particularly not on my holo. Bull’s holo.

“Angela,” Piers says. My skin prickles. Nothing in me responds to that name anymore. “I hope this message reaches you. You didn’t leave a forwarding number with HR, and . . . well, I hope I’ve tracked you down to the right place.”

He pauses, glances down at something outside frame of the recording. A light somewhere above him glistens on his scalp through the thinning patch on the top of his head. I know what he’s doing. I’ve seen the gesture over and over for six years. He’s twisting around the e-signet ring on his right hand. He does that whenever he’s nervous. What does he have to be nervous about?

He runs his hand through his hair. Now he’ll rub his lower lip with his thumb like he’s contemplating a panacea for the world’s ills. I wait impatiently for him to stop twitching.

“I, uh, I hope everything’s okay. I was, well, I was shocked to come back from the conference and find you gone. HR said you just walked in and resigned. No notice. You gave up your term pay and . . . I just really don’t understand, Angie. We’ve been together six years. Why didn’t you tell me if you were planning to leave?”

I glance at Bull. Has he heard this? I can see how he’d take it the wrong way. He stands against the dining table with his back to me, one arm braced against the red, retro plaz, the other holding a bottle of beer to his mouth. I don’t think he’s drinking it. Crap. Definitely heard; definitely took it the wrong way.

Piers continues, “If something’s wrong, if you needed help, why didn’t you come to me? Angie, whatever it is, I can help. Just, uh, just come see me. Come to the office, or come to the house, whatever. I’m really worried about you. This isn’t like you. Hell, it’s not even like you to take a day off . . .”

He goes through the set of nervous gestures again. Christ, Piers.

“So, uh, get in touch, would you? We can talk it through. I’m sure whatever’s going on, we can work it out.” He taps his fingers on the holodeck, making the image shimmy. “Okay. You know where to reach me. Call me, Angie.”

The holo goes dark and I click it off. Shit.

I step over the bags on my way to join Bull at the table. He’s drinking now, his head thrown back, chugging the beer down. I wait for him to finish and set the bottle on the table before I try to talk to him.

He speaks first, his head down, staring at the empty beer bottle. “Call ‘im.” His voice has a soft, deadly edge to it. My neck and shoulders tighten. I hate that tone. The bitter hurt behind it. “ _Angie_.”

“My name’s not Angela. It never was.”

He glances at me. His face is hard, mouth drawn into a tight line. But his eyes are hot. Reddened. “Not Kerey, either, is it?”

“That’s my name now. That’s what you call me and that’s the only name that matters.”

He shakes his head, returns to staring at his empty.

“Bull, I don’t know what you’re thinking—”

“No, you don’t,” he growls.

“Whatever it is, you’re wrong. That was Piers, my boss. My _old_ boss.”

He snorts. “Yeah, what kinda _employment_ he give you?”

I slam my hand on the table. I haven’t done anything wrong, and he’s treating me like I have. “The banking kind! You knew where I came from. You knew I had a job and a life! I gave those up. I walked away. For you!”

He shakes his head, wearily. “It was supposed to be for you.”

“Well it wasn’t! I did it for you. Because you told me you couldn’t be with me while I was living a lie. And I need you. More than I’ve ever needed anything . . .” The tears start, even though I want to be fierce and furious. I can’t. This hurts too much. What if he kicks me out? “And I don’t know what I’ve done . . . what to say to you . . . God, Bull—”

He turns suddenly and in one fluid motion, gathers me against him. I wrap my arms around his neck, my hands around the back of his head, pulling him down to me, burying my face in his throat, my cheek wet against his. “What - what do you want me to say? What do you want to hear? That I won’t go out anymore? I won’t—”

He shakes his head, his cheek rough against mine. “Shut up, Kerey.”

He holds me in silence for a long time. I keep thinking he’s going to carry me over to bed. We’ve had make-up sex before – after I got lost and he found me – and it was amazing, sweet and raging and tender all at once. My belly tightens in anticipation. But he never moves. He just holds me.

Finally, he lifts his head and says, “Where’s that chicken?”

“Over there.” I reach out, cup his face in my hands, look at him closely. “Bull . . . are we okay now?”

He nods. But there are still shadows in his eyes that weren’t there before. I can’t think of anything else to say. Protesting, saying that Piers and I weren’t ever anything more than boss and subordinate, just makes it sound more like we were having an affair. What can I say to make Bull understand? I can’t think of a thing.

Bull lets me go and, slowly, still trying to think of some way to explain, I retrieve the bags. When I bring the take-out back to the table, he’s set out a plate and one set of utensils.

“Are you eating alone?” I ask, lifting an eyebrow. Is he thinking of punishing me? Making me eat on the floor? Jere and Viv did that to me once. It was degrading. Not in a good way. I eye him darkly.

“Not exactly.” He sits down in the padded chair in front of the place setting and pats his thigh.

I settle eagerly into his lap. Now this is a good game. Much more fun than eating on the floor.

“Okay,” he says while he unwraps egg rolls, wontons, his chicken and my soyu with cashew nuts. “Rules.”

I sit up straighter. Games with rules are the best kind.

“No hands. You eat everything I give you. An’ no regurgitating.” He looks at me sternly.

I giggle and tuck my hands behind my back. “I wouldn’t have spit it out if you hadn’t tried to feed me a whole hot pepper.”

He grins. “Let’s see if you can eat everythin’ I feed you this time.”

*

Later, I sit cross-legged on the couch with the Leatherette’s receipts spread around me. My jaw aches pleasantly from what he _did_ feed me. We’ve found a good position: a way I can suck both of his cocks at the same time. It drives him wild. But it does leave me with a sore jaw afterwards. I work my jaw a little while I sort the receipts into piles. I wonder if you can get TMJ from too much oral sex.

The holo across from me beeps. I shake my head, grinning. Bull likes to call from behind the bar and talk dirty to me until I’m so crazed that I run down and beg him to take a break for a quickie in his office. Without looking up from the piles I’m sorting, I reach out and tap the holo’s control wand.

“Isn’t it kind of early to start with the sweet talk?” I ask, teasingly. “You left, what, ten minutes ago?”

“Uh, Angela?”

My head snaps up. I stare at my ex-boss in shock.

He stares back at me. I can see my hazy reflection in his enlarged pupils. The pale oval of my face, the smudges of heavy black eye make-up I’ve already put on for our night out, the frame of my straight hair, white-blonde on top and black underneath where I’ve tinted it the way I always wanted to but couldn’t while I was living my old life, in Piers’s world. I’m glad he can’t see anything else. The tight black leather halter top. The hip-slung black pants. The stiletto boots on the floor next to the couch. God, even what he can see must be a shock. He’s never seen me any other way but carefully scrubbed, in my corporate uniform, my hair up in a regulation knot.

“Piers.” I nod, try to smile. “I’m sorry. I was expecting another call.”

The nervous set of gestures. Ring, hair, lip. It sets my teeth on edge; makes me want to tear my hair out. How did I put up with that for six years?

“Angie, I’m glad I got through to you. I wasn’t sure . . . this is where your autolet service said they forwarded your personal possessions, but I, uh, wasn’t sure if it could be the right place.”

Because it’s a sex club on the wrong end of the City. But we both leave that unsaid.

“I’m glad you called,” I say. The lie sounds smooth to me. I’ve had a lot of practice lying to Piers. Not about work. I was the straightest of straight arrows in my job. But Piers liked to ask about my personal life. To pretend that we were more than employer and employee. That he was human and not another soulless corporate suit. And as my nights and weekends got further and further away from anything his shrivelled straight-laced sensibilities could stomach, I got better and better at lying to him. “I was going to call you on Monday.”

He nods. I don’t think he believes me. Maybe that lie was too obvious. “How are you? How have you been?” he asks.

Better than he could ever imagine. “Fine. I’m fine. I’m sorry if I worried you. Everything’s fine, Piers.”

His eyes shift, right and left, light shining greasily on the whites. What’s he looking for? “Are you, uh, are you sure?

I look at him quizzically. “Yes. Is there something wrong Piers?”

He gives a bark of laughter. “Well, no. Not if you call walking out without a word after six years of working together normal. No, I guess there’s nothing wrong.”

I sigh mentally. I should have guessed he’d be hurt. He always took work personally. “I’m sorry. I should have said something to you first.”

Ring, hair, lip. I bite my tongue to keep from snapping at him. He’s attended _eleven_ different seminars on public speaking – I know, I signed him up for each one – and he still hasn’t gotten rid of that nervous tic.

“You mean, this was premeditated?”

“What do you mean, _premeditated_?” I ask. He’s making it sound like murder. My mind flicks to Marcus, dead for over a year. I control a shiver.

“Planned. I got the idea somehow that this was spontaneous. Something you were . . . forced to do, maybe.”

Forced? What the hell does he think is going on? “I wasn’t forced to leave, Piers.”

Ring, hair, lip. This time when his hand comes away, his chin is wrinkled, his mouth pursed. “I realize that you probably can’t talk now . . .”

“Now’s fine.”

He glances around again, as though he could see outside the confines of the holo’s frame if he strains. “I mean that you can’t talk freely right now . . .”

What he’s looking for – or more precisely, _who_ – finally dawns on me. I struggle to keep a straight face. “I’m alone here, Piers. I can talk. Look, I think you’ve gotten the wrong idea about this. I decided on a change. That’s all. There’s nothing sinister—”

“Sinister? Oh, no.” He gives a false hearty laugh. But at least he stops trying to peer around the edges of the holo. “No, no. Nothing like that.”

“I’m sorry if you got the wrong impression—”

“I think they’ve brainwashed you, Angela,” he blurts. His face purples after he says it.

I blink at him. “Brainwashed?” I ask, slowly, trying to decide what the appropriate response to that is. Hysterical laughter, or . . . hysterical laughter?

“Yes. I mean, what are you doing at a freak club in the Zone?” The hair on the back of my neck goes up. Thank God Bull isn’t here to hear this. “This isn’t you, Angie. You never missed a day of work. Hell, you were never even a minute late. I’ve never had to reprimand you for anything. You’re a model employee. You were up for promotion next quarter. I go away for two weeks and when I come back I find you’ve called in sick for a week and then disappeared . . . _what_ is going on? I left you in charge! I just don’t understand.”

No, I don’t suppose he would. “I’m sure from the outside this looks bad—” I begin.

“You’re sure as hell right about that!” Ring, hair, lip. Controlling the outburst.

“If you’d let me explain—”

“Yes, please do. I really need to hear this.”

I tilt my head. See the motion reflected in his pupils. Why am I explaining anything to him? “You know, Piers,” I say slowly. “I _quit_. I don’t work for you anymore. And I don’t have to explain shit.” I reach for the control wand.

“Wait! Angie, I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I got carried away there.” Ring, hair, lip. “It’s just that I’ve been . . . so worried about you.”

Something’s off. Piers has always been interested in my personal life, maybe overly so for my boss, but he’s never been pushy about it before. And what does he care, anyway, now that I’ve left?

“Thank you for your concern,” I say coolly. “But I’m fine.”

Piers shakes his head. “I’ve approached this wrong. I see that now. Playing the blame-game. It doesn’t get us anywhere.”

I try not to roll my eyes. Negotiating-tactics workshop.

“I think if we could just meet in realtime,” he continues. “Sit down. Talk this through. I think that would get us moving forward again.”

Moving forward? Where does he think we’re going? “Piers, I appreciate your concern, but I really don’t see the point.”

Ring. Hair. Lip. If he does that again, I’m going to scream. “Let’s just pencil it in, shall we?”

Pencil it in what? Does he think I keep an appointment calendar amongst my bondage paraphernalia?

“Today’s, uh—” He pauses like he doesn’t know what day it is. Without me to supply him with a daily agenda, maybe he doesn’t.

“Sunday,” I supply.

“Right. Sunday. Should we say Tuesday? I’m tied up in the morning, and, oh, a staff meeting at three—”

He has got to be kidding. “Piers, I think it would be a waste of time. I’m not going to meet with you. I really do appreciate the call, though. It’s been nice to talk with you.” That lie’s so bald even he probably won’t swallow it.

“You’re not?” Little-boy-lost shock registers on his face for a moment.

“No,” I say, trying for gentle. Probably failing.

His eyes narrow. “I think you’re making a mistake.”

Is he threatening me? I could bury him with everything I know about the half-assed way he runs the department. Compliance. I control a snort. He couldn’t comply with regs. for wiping his nose.

At my silence, he says, “This unreasonable behavior – this lack of openness to suggestions – concerns me.”

The staff-management-staff-morale course. I sigh.

“It makes me all the more concerned about who is influencing you, Angela.”

Oh, he has _got_ to be kidding. “No one is influencing me! And you’re beginning to really piss me off, while we’re providing each other with honest behavioural evaluations, Piers.”

Ring, hair, lip. I ball my fists against my thighs to keep from screaming, punching through the holo and grabbing both hands and slamming them down on the table in front of him. Didn’t he learn _one fucking thing_ on all those courses?!

“Maybe we should call it a night.” We’re back to negotiating-tactics. “Regroup. Talk again in the morning.”

I’m going to be out. Or the holo’s going to be programmed to say I’m out. “Fine, Piers.”

He gives me a tight, fake smile. Not nearly as brave as Cecile’s. “Okay, Angie. We’ll talk tomorrow.”

Not if I can help it. I reach for the holo wand.

“Good night, Angie.”

“Bye, Piers.” I click off the holo. Run my hands through my hair. Scream to release a little tension. No one will hear me over the bass beat pounding away downstairs anyway.

I curl into a ball, pound my fists against my thighs. Why did Piers track me down? What the fuck does he want, anyway? I’m done. I’m gone. I _quit_. I left that life – my old life – behind. I’m finished with the straight world. It has nothing to offer me. Bull told me that, and he was right. I’ve never been happier than these last two weeks with him, despite the rough spots. No longer pretending to be something I’m not. No longer hiding the freak inside. No longer having to face the Pierses of the world every day with a smile, dying inside, feeling ashamed and dirty because if they knew, if anyone _knew_ what was inside me they wouldn’t smile back. They’d cross themselves, spit at me, run away screaming _._

I jump up off the couch, grab my boots, shove my feet into them. Cross the floor at a run. Hurl myself into the lift. Out of the lift, onto the dance floor. Into the press of bodies. Half-naked. Sweat streaking the bared expanses of white and black and brown and yellow and even purple skin. Piercings and holotats gleaming in the strobe lights. Spikes and swirls and sweeps of hair that would set an employee handbook on fire.

I throw myself into the press and join the wild, tribal dance.

*

Exhausted by hours of dancing, enervated by my confrontation with Piers, I loll against Bull’s side. He drapes one arm around me, lazily stroking his fingers up and down my bare arm. My skin’s sweat-sticky. Like we’ve been fucking. I wish we had. Dancing was good; it took the edge off my anger. But it’s not like sex with Bull. Nothing is.

On the other side of the big, circular booth, Cecile watches me from behind her screen of blonde dreadlocks. She leans forward, across the table, and stretches one arm out to me.

“Kerey, you okay?” she asks, under cover of the buzz of conversation from the other bar and club staff crammed into the booth, the bump-and-grind music that’s accompanying the two strippers dancing in the club’s signature cages.

I nod, not taking my eyes off the nearest stripper. She’s got the biggest boobs I’ve ever seen on a human being. They don’t look real, they’re so big. I focus on those massive mounds, watching them bounce and sway. The view distracts me. Keeps me from having to think.

Bull’s deep baritone in my ear. His warm breath against my skin. “You wanna go, Ker? You had enough?”

I shake my head, sit up a little straighter. I don’t want him to think I’m having a bad time. He might not bring me back. And I really do like it here. With his friends. Feeling like part of a group. Feeling like I belong. “No. Sorry, I was glazing.”

“You tired?” He nuzzles my ear, sending a bright shiver through me. I love it when he’s affectionate with me in public. None of my other doms have been.

“Not yet. Do you want a beer? It’s our round. I’ll go.”

“Sure.”

Ever the bartender, he collects empties from the middle of the table and hands them to me. I take a quick inventory of the faces around the table, to see if anyone wants anything different. “More tomato juice, Jello?”

From his position in the far corner of the booth, Jello looks up, blanches to ash, and hunkers back down into the padded seat. I guess motion’s still making him queasy. Blood loss will do that. “Fresh bandages?” I ask him cheerfully, enjoying the opportunity to get a little of my own back.

“Leave ‘im alone,” Bull growls. He flicks dark eyes over his moronic, vampire-loving friend. “Milk might help. Iron? Fuck if I know.”

I shake my head. I’ve donated blood. They never told me to drink milk. “Bloody Mary,” I suggest brightly.

“Fuck off,” Jello groans, sinking deeper into his seat and wrapping his bandaged arms around his waist.

Grinning, I head to the bar.

Mick, his bald, black head shining under the bar’s plasmas, smiles a lighthouse smile at me and takes the empties. “You having a good time, Kerey?” he asks, his voice slow and thick as molasses.

Mick was one of the bar staff I met last week. His size and deep voice intimidated me at first. But after just a few minutes of talking with him, I could sense the teddy-bear under the muscles and leather. “Yeah. Sorry you can’t join us tonight.”

Mick shrugs philosophically. “Next week.” He begins stacking bottles on the bar for me to take back to the table.

In mid-motion, he pauses. His head turns to follow someone moving behind me. He places the bottle on the bar with a thunk. “This is trouble,” he says. “You get back to the table. I’ll bring these over.”

Nonplussed, I turn to follow his gaze. A woman in black fishnets that make her legs look like they go up to her chin leans against our table. Her back is to me, so I can’t see what she’s doing, but I can tell from the angle of her body that she must be shoving her bustier-clad breasts pretty much under Bull’s nose.

I flush with anger and push away from the bar. But before I’ve taken a step towards the booth, I’m shaking my head at myself. What am I worried about? Women shove their boobs under Bull’s nose all the time. If that’s what he wanted, he could take his pick.

Instead, he picked _me_.

I straighten my shoulders and walk back to the booth unhurriedly. As I pass the hanging cage, I check out the view again – God, she really does have superhuman tits – and press my thumb against the credit reader set into a cage bar. She deserves something for having to carry those things around on her chest all the time.

I slide around Fishnets and into a sliver of space next to Bull. There was more space here when I got up. As soon as I squeeze in next to him, he shifts over. Did he spread out to make Fishnets think there was no room to sit down?

Fishnets backs up a step at my sudden appearance. A funny, ruffling silence settles on the booth. Like everyone’s waiting for something. Violence. Screaming. I don’t know, but it has an ugly edge to it.

Bull drapes his arm around me again and I lean into his side. Look up into Fishnets’s face. Blink placidly. She’s beautiful. In that hard, glamorous way some drag-queens are beautiful. All sharp angles. Artificial curves and contours. Studied fabulousness. Her raven’s-wing hair is done up in a chignon that towers above the back of her head. So perfect it looks lacquered. I look out from under my own sweat-stringy, two-tone bangs and grin.

“Hi, I’m Kerey.” I don’t offer my hand. Just a broader grin.

She takes another step back. Recovers. A razor-edged black eyebrow arches. “Not the infamous Kerey?” she asks. Her voice is breathy, low. Not quite Viv’s purr, but close.

I shrug. “Unless there are two of us, I guess so.”

She laughs, a high, artificial tinkle. “And she’s funny, too, Bull.”

I shake my hair back from my face. Being patronized always sets my teeth on edge, and after Piers earlier in the evening, this is too much. “I do all sorts of tricks,” I say. “Would you like to see?”

Fishnets eyes me in a way that says she knows a threat when she hears one. Bull’s hand wraps around my shoulder and he pulls me a little tighter to his side.

“Ker, this is Lana. She works here sometimes.”

She’s a stripper? My grin broadens.

“Do you make good tips in the cage?” I ask, deliberately shifting my eyes from Fishnets’ normally-proportioned chest to Mammoth Mammaries dancing away behind her. Bet I can guess who makes better tips.

Her red-lacquered mouth purses poisonously. “Remind me of what you do? I don’t think Bull said. He only mentioned you the once, after all.”

I grin. I’ve gotten her attention. “Unemployed,” I say cheerfully. “Sponging off Bull.”

Bull chuckles. “Sponge away.”

“Kerey’s an accountant,” Cecile volunteers from across the table. “She’s been doing our taxes. She’s brilliant.”

“Say that after you see the fine the RCO’s going to slap you with,” I respond.

“An accountant?” Fishnets’ patronizing tone and eyebrow are back. “How . . . sexy.”

I twist my head to look up at Bull. “What do you think?”

He nuzzles my ear and whispers, “I think you’re sex on legs. Don’t let Lana get to you. She likes to sling it around, but there’s nothin’ there for you to worry about.”

I reach up and cup his jaw, holding his face against mine a second longer than necessary. His warm, wet tongue circles the inner curve of my ear. I shiver with the sensation. God, he can turn me on so easily.

When I look back at Fishnets, she’s watching me with narrowed eyes. I grin so broadly my cheeks ache.

Mick’s arrival with our drinks breaks our staring contest. Fishnets has to step back to let Mick put his armful of bottles down on our table. “Anybody want anything else?” he asks. His gleaming black head pans right to left around the table. “Jello, if you’re going to puke, do it in the head.”

Jello’s gone from grey to green. Everyone has the same thought at the same time. And suddenly everyone on the other side of the booth is moving, clamouring out and pulling Jello with them. Hazen, the lanky bartender from the neo-goth club Nexus and Jello’s roommate, grabs Jello’s arm, pulls it over shoulders so raw-boned I can see the ball-and-socket joints beneath his ripped t-shirt, and drags Jello towards the toilets at the back of the club.

Beside me, Bull sighs. “I’d better go help.”

I scoot off the seat to let him out. I stand next to the booth and watch him go, feeling useless. Maybe Jello is in real trouble.

Lou catches my eyes. She shakes her close-cropped head. “Don’t worry about him. That vampire bitch is going to be the death of him someday, but probably not today. We’ve seen him a lot worse.”

Nikki, a dishwasher at The Raisin, nods. “Remember when he needed a transfusion? That was kinda scary.”

I glance at her. “ _Kinda_ scary?”

Lou laughs. “He’s an idiot. You must have figured that out by now.”

“Yeah, but—”

Lou shrugs. “He chooses it. No-one makes him play blood-muffin to Hannah and her kiss.”

“Kiss?”

“It’s what a group of vampires are called. A kiss,” Fishnets interjects, leaning close to blow a fake one at me. “Didn’t you know?”

“I must’ve missed that class when I was getting my CPA.”

She bats her eyes at me and I can tell she’s working on a nasty response. I cut her off by saying to Lou. “They’re not _real_ vampires. How much blood can they take out of him?”

Lou lifts her hands. “No idea. Prosthetic teeth. Anticoagulants regenned into their saliva. Probably a lot. Several of them feed while Hannah does him. Or so we’ve heard.” She puts her arm around Cecile’s shoulders. Cecile smiles up at her dom. Does Cee really suspect Lou is cheating on her? They look so close.

Cecile shakes her head, dreads wagging sadly. “Jello.” She sighs.

The two of them slide back into the booth, along with the others displaced by Jello’s exodus. I sink back down into my own seat. There’s plenty of room now for Fishnets, on either side, but no one offers her a seat.

I watch her while everyone sorts out their drinks. She’s watching the door to the men’s toilet. Watching for Bull. The scene was for his benefit, then. Nothing really to do with me. I pick up my Corona and listen to the resumed conversation. It’s mostly about Jello and his fixation on the vampire-girl, Hannah. Did they talk about Bull and me this way? I squirm a little in my seat. I hope not. Maybe not. Bull’s pretty closed-mouthed. But Jello couldn’t keep a secret even if someone liqui-stitched his mouth shut. He probably told the world.

I bury my embarrassment in my beer. Keep listening while I drink too fast. I’m going to have a headache in the morning. Through the haze of embarrassment, it finally penetrates that even though everyone’s talking about Jello and his jones, none of them are condemning him. No one’s judging him or ridiculing his need. The tone around the table is sympathetic. Like they’ve all been there.

I look up, find Cecile watching me. She smiles, an open, friendly smile that I return. The sting of the knowledge that I was once the topic _de jour_ fades. Wiped away by the empathy in the voices around me and Cecile’s honest smile.

That warm sense of being among friends gives me the courage to slide over a little in the booth and pat the empty place beside me.

“Have a seat, if you want,” I say to Fishnets.

Her eyes flick to me, widen. The practiced poise slips a notch. “Uh, no, thanks. My shift’s about to start. I’ll, um, see you later maybe.”

She turns and glides away, moving smoothly on what must be six-inch stilettos. I have to admire that. I’m pretty good in stilettos, but after four inches, I begin to worry about breaking an ankle.

Cecile’s voice draws my attention back to the booth. “That was really . . . generous of you, Kerey.”

I shrug. “It was about Bull, not me.”

Cecile glances at Lou, who shakes her head. Cecile presses her lips together, then says, “Ask Bull about his thirtieth birthday.”

“Cee,” Lou says warningly.

“What?” Cecile snaps at her dom. “It’s unfair of him to bring her here without giving her any warning.”

And I realize that’s what Cecile was trying to do earlier. By having me remind Bull that tonight’s gathering was at the Cage. The warm feeling in my belly expands. She really is a friend.

“Maybe he doesn’t remember,” Lou says. “He was so drunk it’s surprising he was standing.”

“Something was standing,” Cecile mutters, but sinks into mutinous silence at her dom’s glower.

I smile at the two of them. I probably should be annoyed that they’re keeping things from me, but I’m not. I’m just happy to be here, to be included. I smile into my beer.

A pair of leather-clad legs stride into my peripheral vision. The leather’s shiny. Wet. And, eww, what is that smell? I look up, setting down my empty beer, and find Bull leaning over me, retrieving his jacket from the back of the booth.

“Sorry, Ker,” he says to me. “We’re gonna have to call it a night. Jello didn’t quite make it to the can.” He flicks his fingers at his wet front. He’s washed off whatever landed on him, but he hasn’t managed to get rid of the very ripe smell.

“Okay.” I climb out of the booth. Sway a little. Steady myself against the edge of the table and lean over to kiss Cecile on both cheeks. Then Lou. Nikki rises in her seat so I can reach her. Others I can’t reach blow kisses. Like they’re really sorry to see me go.

Bull takes my hand and pulls me away finally. Despite the stink, I tuck myself against his side as we walk through the club. Mick waves as we pass the bar and I break away from Bull to go kiss him goodbye, too.

Bull retrieves me. “What’s with you?”

Tucking myself back against him, I shrug. “I love them all.”

Outside, I roll my head back against Bull’s shoulder to look up at the night sky. The City’s light pollution and perpetual haze block the stars, but the yellowed moon lights the night.

“Look at how beautiful that is,” I say.

“Ker, are you drunk?”

“No,” I say indignantly. Looking back down at the street makes me sway. “Okay, maybe a little.”

“You’ve had two beers.”

“Three. You gave me one earlier.” Too cool me off while I was dancing.

“Three.” Bull snorts in what might be disgust. “At least you’re a happy drunk.”

“I am, aren’t I?” I throw my arms around his neck, try to kiss his jaw, but the stink deters me. “I hate to tell you this, honey, but you smell really bad.”

“Honey?” Bull chuckles. “I hate to tell you this, _babe_ , but I’m still going to fuck you silly when we get home.”

That sets me off into a fit of mad giggles.

*

Bull drags me into the shower with him. He’s so big there’s barely room for me to move in the square enclosure. I end up pressed against one of the plexi-walls. Which is probably a good thing, because I’m still a little unsteady.

I wash bile off him and he washes sweat off me. He takes a long time over the brand on my hip, sponging it carefully, even though it’s fully healed. I’m getting better about it. I no longer jump every time he touches it. Or freak out and cry on his shoulder for an hour.

When it’s my turn with the sponge, I get lost tracing the heavy muscles of his back, following the rivulets of water as they snake down over his golden skin. Bull lets me admire him for a long time, but finally turns me back under the spray. He lathers my hair, strong fingers massaging the shampoo/conditioner/straightener into my scalp. Just hard enough to make it tingle; not hard enough to hurt.

“How do you know how to do that?” I sigh with pleasure. “You don’t even have any hair.”

Bull chuckles. “I wasn’t born bald.”

I open one eye, shut it when a stream of foam threatens to drip over my eyelid. “You weren’t?”

“Nope. Full thatch as a baby. First to grow a beard as a kid. First to lose it as an adult. Karmic cycle.”

I open the eye again. Ouch. That stings. “Karma? I didn’t know you believe in karma.”

A deep chuckle. He pushes my head back into the spray. Wipes his hand over my hair several times to get rid of the foam. “I absolutely believe in karma.” He pulls me tight against him, slides his hands down to cup my ass. “Wouldn’t a held out for you for two years if I didn’t.”

I wrap my arms around his neck, slide my slippery-wet skin against his. “Did you really?” I knew he’d liked me for a while. I didn’t know how deep it went.

“Yeah.” He grins; he bats the shower controls so that the spray turns off and warm air dries us. “Except for th’ one time. Probably shoulda told you about that before we went to th’ Cage.”

I arch an eyebrow in imitation of Fishnets. “Let me guess.”

“Yeah,” he admits ruefully. “Jello and Haze paid for a lapdance. For my birthday. Things got outta hand.”

His thirtieth birthday. I’m glad I didn’t have to ask.

“After that, my secret was out.”

I’m lost. “Which secret?” Surely everyone knew about his dual equipment. He was advertising the fact when I first came to Barzarre.

He squeezes my ass. “My thing for you. Like I said, things got outta hand.” A wry grin. “When I was comin’, I called your name.”

When he was coming . . . “With Lana?”

“Yeah.”

I stare at his chest. I’m not sure how to feel. I shouldn’t be jealous of Bull’s past lovers. But the fact that he fucked Lana bothers me. It dissolves my happy beer-buzz. I pop open the shower door and step out.

“Ker, where you goin’?”

I turn back and look at him, frowning. “How many women have you slept with?”

Bull crosses his arms over his chest. He leans against the shower door and frowns back. “Haven’t kept a tally. Why?”

“If you had to count now, how many?”

He shrugs. “I dunnow. Maybe fifteen. Sixteen. Somethin’ like that. Why?”

“Because I want to know how often I’m going to bump into your old flames.”

He rolls his eyes. “Kerey.” He steps out of the shower and draws me back into his arms. “Lana’s not an old flame. She gave me a lap dance. It got outta hand. She wanted to see _them_  . . . one thing led to another an’ she ended up jerkin’ me off. That’s all. I never fucked her. Never even kissed her. I barely remember it. Only reason it’s even memorable is ‘cause after that everyone knew I had a thing for you.”

“Oh.”

He smiles down at me. “I kinda like you bein’ jealous.”

I shake my head. The room whirls. “Jealousy’s not good.” I think of Marcus. Insanely jealous Marcus. Dead Marcus. “Weight . . . weighty . . . karmic . . . burden . . . something.”

“Think we’d better get you in bed before you fall over,” Bull says. I’m not that drunk, but I’m not going to protest if that’s the direction he wants to go in. I let him guide me through the forest of exercise equipment to the bed.

He slides me under the covers, joins me with a sigh. I stretch against him. His warm, silky-clean skin against my front. The cool sheets against my back. Mmm.

“Bull,” I say quietly, looking up into his face. “Did you know Marcus was dead?”

“Yeah, I remember hearin’ that. Bad poppers or somethin’, right?” He teases out a few strands of my damp hair between his fingers, flicks the tips against my lips.

“Cee said he ODed.”

“Yeah, that sounds right.” His dark eyes narrow. “You knew, right?”

I shake my head. “Cee mentioned it today. When I was picking up the receipts.”

He slides his arms around me, pulls me close and looks down at me seriously. “No wonder you were dancin’ so hard. An’ so far away at the Cage. Why didn’t you say somethin’ earlier?.”

I shake my head against the pillow of his arm. “I’m okay. Really, I am. I was shocked when Cee told me. But I wasn’t . . . I wasn’t surprised. I could see Marcus going that way even when we were together.”

“You sure?” Bull watches me, eyes hooded and soft. “’Cause I’ll listen if you wanna talk about it.”

I smile at him. At his considerateness. Who really wants to hear about their lover’s dead ex? But his willingness to listen makes my insides go liquid and warm. “You know what I want to talk about?” When lifts a dark eyebrow, I continue, “I want to talk about tonight. I had a really good time. I like your friends. They treat me like I’m one of them. Like I’m not an outsider. I feel like I really belong—” I stop because my throat suddenly constricts.

Bull gives me a lop-sided grin. “You do belong.” His grin widens. “You belong to me.”

I giggle. A tension I didn’t realize was building while we were talking about Marcus washes out of me.

“You know what I been thinkin’?” he asks.

Not exactly, but I can guess it involves sex. I wriggle in anticipation.

He traces his fingers over my ass, circling and swirling over the soft skin. “I been thinkin’ that you ain’t ever been properly introduced to these two.” He trails his fingers up my side, down my arm, and guides my hand between us to wrap around his top cock. It swells against my fingers. “It’s not right. You bein’ intimate with them and not knowin’ their names.”

“They have names?”

“Uh-huh. This is Thing One.” He closes his hand around mine, squeezes gently. “An’ this is Thing Two.” He moves my hand to his second cock. It’s fully erect, blue-steel and velvet in my palm.

“Thing One and Thing Two?” I ask. “Does that make you—”

“Th’ Cat in the Fuckin’ Hat.” He grins, teeth gleaming in the moon-and-streetlight-lit dark. I return his grin, thinking of the children’s story. “Now Thing One—” He moves my hand back to his first cock. “He’s a pussy man. Give him a sniff of pussy–” His hand slides away from mine for a moment to press his long fingers against my labia, parting them, rubbing along the slick inner membranes. My insides go hot and liquid. My head spins in a way that has nothing to do with the beer. “An’ you got his attention.”

My giggles turn breathy. He rocks his hips slowly, sliding his top cock in my grip, his second cock against my belly. He pulls me closer, guides my knee over his thigh. My body opens for him. Cool air kisses me. The silk-steel of his penis brushes against my damp pubic hair.

“Yeah.” He reaches between us, moves my hand aside and positions his top cock so it rubs into the wet groove of my vagina. “Yeah, just like that. Man, that gets him goin’.”

I writhe and sigh with pleasure as he grinds himself against me.

“Mmm . . . let’s not forget about Thing Two, though. Now Thing Two, he’s an ass man. Nothing he likes better than this tight little ass right here.” He kneads my ass with one huge hand. His fingertips slip into the crack to brush the pucker of my sphincter. I moan and press back into his hand.

“But sometimes, you know, they like to switch hats. Give Thing One a chance at that fine ass. Think we should give that a try tonight? Turn over for me, baby.”

My mind has shut down. Swamped by the delicious dirtiness of his words, uttered in that deep, textured voice. All I can do is follow his lead. I rise up onto my hands and knees and wait for him, trembling and delirious with excitement.

“Here.” He pushes two pillows under my chest. His warm, heavy hand settles between my shoulder-blades, guides me down onto the softness of the pillows. I wrap my arms around them, rest my cheek against one of them and look at him. “That’s a good angle.” He traces the arch of my hip with his fingertips. His eyes, heavy-lidded and incendiary, follow the motion. His scrutiny makes my insides clench deliciously.

“Think we need one more thing here,” he says.

My head spins. Another _thing_? Is he going to use a dildo on me? I didn’t even know he had one. Where’s he going to put it?

He rises onto his knees and opens the drawer of the nightstand. From the jumble of junk in the drawer he pulls out a man’s tie. I’ve never seen him wear a tie, or a suit, or anything other than a t-shirt. Then I realize what he’s going to do with the tie and I moan in anticipation.

He pops a condom out of the industrial-sized dispenser we’ve set on the top of the nightstand and moves around behind me. I close my eyes to concentrate on the sensations. He loops the silk tie around one ankle. Constriction as he ties the knot. Not too tight. Perfect. His hand on my other ankle. Another knot. He strokes my calves and spreads my legs to the extent that the ligature on my ankles allows.

“I’m gonna kneel on this, Kerey,” he tells me just before he does it. The weight of his shins presses my ankles deep into the mattress. His hands descend on my hips. Squeeze. Stroke. Every sensation feels amplified by the restraint.

His voice from behind me. “Look at you. Waitin’ for me. Look how beautiful you are.” He presses against me, pushing the tips of his cocks against my wet openings. “Yeah, that’s it. Right there. That’s what I want. That’s what my boys want. Mmm, Kerey.”

I shudder. My body’s so tight, tension zipping through me in electric arcs. I’m going to climax before he even starts to fuck me. He grinds his tips against me, pushing in a little way, withdrawing, pushing in further. The motion, the sensation, ripples through me. My body spasms. My eyes roll back in my head. I’m going to faint. I bury my face in the pillow, moaning.

He bends over me, dropping kisses on my shoulders. His hands roam over me, rubbing, touching, stroking everywhere. My scarred back, my shoulders, my hips, my ass. He pushes my cheeks together with his hands and thrusts between them, the lubricated condom and my own wetness creating a wild, slippery friction. I tremble violently.

“Not yet, baby. Hold back, Ker. Wait for it. Lemme get all the way inside you. Yeah . . . that’s it. Don’t rush it.”

I can’t wait. I’m shaking all over. My vagina and ass are clenching, clutching him, trying to pull him deep inside me, spasming with the beginnings of my orgasm. The pressure is building and it’s bearing down on me and I can’t stop it.

He pushes all the way into me, thrusting deep. Rubbing hard into the nerve bundles in the back of my vagina and ass. The pressure in places I’m not used to makes me writhe with tension. He rolls his hips, grinding in and out. His balls bump against my clitoris and it sparks and burns like he’s touched it with a cattle prod.

He groans, guttural and rich with pleasure. “Yeah, oh, yeah, that’s it. I can feel you comin’. Hold onto it. Stay with me, baby.” He moves, fucking me slowly. Deep, burning, buried, deep. I can’t wait. I’m trying so hard to obey him, to hold out, to prolong my orgasm. I’m sobbing, clutching the pillow, straining against the knots holding my ankles in place. And it’s still right there, an unbearable tension coiling and seizing inside me, clenching against each thrust so hard it hurts.

“Bull!” I scream, unable to hold back any more.

“Yeah, that’s it. You can come now. Come for me, baby.”

His permission sets me free and I’m on fire, every nerve ending detonating. He holds my hips and rides me, pounding into my orgasm. My body spasms around those two pistoning cocks, soars, ignites. I go blind, deaf. Insensate. Everything I am is focused on the bright expanding darkness inside me. The concussive waves of pleasure. I shudder uncontrollably. Drown.


	2. Chapter 2

Bull withdrawing from me brings me back to semi-consciousness. He strokes me with one hand while he unties my ankles. He talks to me, his voice deep and soft. Calming. Normalizing after the intensity of our sex.

“. . . there, that’s okay. I’m just gonna clean us up a little here. Don’t move yet. Stay where you are, Ker. You’re okay.”

I turn my head on the pillow, crack open an eye to watch him. He’s so careful to keep us both clean. He washes himself, paying special attention to the base of his joined cocks where he wasn’t covered by the condom. Then it’s my turn. The antiseptic wipes he uses are cool and soft. He uses a second wipe for my ass, cleaning me thoroughly. I know he worries about infection.

Emotion swells. A giant golden bubble of afterglow. I love him in that moment. I can’t help it, can’t keep it to myself.

“I think I love you.”

He tilts his head at me. Grins. “You would say that while I’m wipin’ your ass.”

I laugh. He picks up a pillow and drops it over my face. When I bat it away, he grabs it and tucks it under his head as he stretches out next to me. I roll slowly onto my side, stinging and sore – that was a little faster and harder than we usually go at it – but also wonderfully languid. He tucks the towel we keep next to the bed between my legs. So I don’t have to sleep in a wet spot.

He plucks pillows out of the way and pulls me close. “An’ you love Mick an’ everyone back at the Cage, too. Includin’ Jello who’s probably still projectile vomitin’ in the can. I gotta wonder about your taste in men.” We laugh together and he kisses my nose, my forehead. “How you doin’?” he asks. He always asks after sex.

I nod. Nestle into the warm curves of his body. “Good.”

“Yeah?” He punctuates his words with small kisses. Gentle brushes of his full lips against mine. Enough to keep my head spinning and that golden bubble full and shimmering inside me. “You sure? ‘Cause I meant what I said earlier. ‘Bout Marcus. If you want to tell me anythin’, I’ll listen.”

“You would?” His persistent offer surprises me. Comforts and warms me in a very deep place.

“Yeah.” He yawns. “You got about five minutes before I fall asleep, though.”

I smile and rub my face against the firm mounds of his chest. “I’m really okay about it. I guess . . . I always knew that something like that would happen to him. I tried to stop it, slow it down, when I was with him. But it just got worse and worse. He was on poppers all the time. Even when we were together—”

Bull grunts. He must know that using the serotonin-boosting poppers during sex is asking for an aneurism.

“—nothing I said or did made a difference. So I stopped trying, and then I stopped seeing him.”

“Didn’t know you ended it.”

“It took me a while.” Two months too long. He was my first dom and I really didn’t know how to say _no_ and _goodbye_ to him. But a night with a cat-o-nine-tails, a bottomless bag of poppers, and an interrogation about my imagined affair with someone named “Edgar” that started as foreplay and became all-too-real before I passed out convinced me I had to end it. “He scared me at the end. He wasn’t in control anymore. The drugs had taken over.”

Bull cuddles me very close. “That reminds me, you an’ me, we never decided on a safe-word.”

“Do we need one?” I glance up at his face. His eyes are closed. He looks content.

“If you want me to do this kinda thing to you, yeah.” His fingertips trace the scars on my back.

I shake my head, cuddle back into his chest. “Marcus and Viv both liked to do whipping scenes. It was never as much of a turn-on for me as it was for them.” I stroke his chest for a moment. There is something that would turn me on a very great deal. Much more than whipping. But I never trusted any of my Masters enough to suggest it. “You know what I would like, though?”

“Mmm?”

“I’d like you to shave me.” I take his hand and press it against my mons through the towel. “Here.”

“Yeah?” He caresses me gently. So gently I don’t even feel a twinge of soreness. My insides melt all over again at his light touch. “We could do that. You know you gotta keep it shaved, right? Lettin’ it grow back itches like hell.”

“How do you know?”

He chuckles. “Let’s just say, from personal experience. But, yeah, you wanna do that. We could definitely do that.” His hand slides around my hip, strokes my ass.

We lie in silence, cuddling. I can’t keep a crazy smile off my face. I love the idea of him shaving me. It feels like such an intimate thing. And the idea of him shaving his balls and suffering the terrible itch while the hair grew back keeps me giggling inside.

But thoughts of Marcus and Viv keep coming back, finally turning my smile into a grimace. “Bull—?” I begin in a whisper.

“Yeah?”

“Is there something wrong with me? Something about me that makes my doms go crazy? I mean, I’ve heard of the occasional bad ride, but between Marcus and Viv . . .”

He kisses my forehead. “You’ve had shit luck.” He’s silent for a moment, then asks softly, “You wanna know the truth?”

My belly tightens in a way that has nothing to do with sex. That sounds . . . ominous. “Uh, yes?”

Bull sighs. “You got this reserve about you, Kerey. This distance. I saw it the first time you came into the club. Made me want to break it down. I can see how a top might think that pain’d be the way to do it. An’ how it might get outta hand.”

The golden bubble bursts. “So you’re saying I brought this on myself. Marcus freaking out and whipping me so hard he scarred me and Viv _branding_ me, that was all my fault—”

“No!” he growls and pulls back from me until he can look down into my face. His eyes glitter. He’s angry, but I don’t think it’s at me. “I’m not sayin’ it’s your fault. The top’s always supposed to be in control. Always. I’m sayin’ I can see how it would happen. An’ why it happened to you. I’m _not_ sayin’ it’s right.”

My lower lip quivers and I bite down on it. I don’t want him to be angry, not after we’ve had such amazing sex. And I don’t want to hear that there’s some flaw in me that everyone else can see that makes my doms abuse me.

“Fuck, Kerey.” He pulls me close again. Strokes my back. “Why d'you ask questions like that?”

I shrug against his arms. Sniffle a little. “I thought I wanted to know.”

A deep sigh. “Listen to me. Without doin’ a tail-spin this time. No one thinks what that maroon bitch did to you was right. An’ I’m _not_ sayin’ you brought it on yourself. But you gotta know how you come off to people. You seem distant, Ker. Like tonight in the Cage when you zoned out. Even sometimes when we’re fuckin’ and I know you’re into it, sometimes you seem . . . like you’re not quite there.”

I begin to protest. How can he think I’m distant? I’ve never been more _involved_ during sex than I am with him.

“Listen,” he growls. “I don’t mind. I _like_ that you get lost in it. I think it’s sexy. But I can see how someone else’d see it another way.”

I close my eyes. Rest my forehead against the firm curve of his chest. “So it is me.”

“No.” He tilts my face up to his and kisses me. “Yeah, okay, in a way, it is you. But it’s not your fault. See the difference?”

“No.”

“Ker . . . this shit ain’t simple, okay? People think bein’ a top is easy, but it’s not. All the time I’m with you, I’m thinkin’ about you. Whether you’re enjoyin’ it. Whether I’m pushing you too far. It’s not like a casual fuck or a blowjob where I can just close my eyes an’ fantasize. Like that time with Lana. I wasn’t thinkin’ about her. I was just gettin’ off. When I’m with you, I’m thinkin’ about nothin’ but you. I gotta be in control the whole time, ‘cause what we do is extreme and if I lose control, I could tear you up. An’ I don’t want any of our nights endin’ in medical.”

He pauses, rests his mouth against my forehead. “When I’m that focused on you, and you don’t seem _there_ , it makes me push harder, take it further, than I should. The further away you seem, the more I push. If you weren’t livin’ here . . . if we weren’t together all the time . . . I dunnow, maybe I’d push too hard. I think that’s what happened with your other doms.”

I snake my arms around his neck. Press myself tight against him. “So you think I made them crazy.”

“Fuck no. Ker, would you listen to what I’m sayin’ and stop turnin’ it around on me? I think Viv was bug-nuts long before you met her. An’ Marcus doin’ poppers all the time had nothin’ to do with you. He was an addict and there’s shit-all you can do to help addicts. They gotta decide to help themselves. But maybe there’s a reason they lost it with _you_ instead of the next bottom. You see what I’m sayin’?”

And finally it sinks in. Like when everyone back at the Cage was talking about Jello and his obsession with the vamp-girl. It’s the difference between blame and sympathy. Condemnation and understanding.

“Yes,” I say.

“Good,” Bull grunts. “’Cause I’d hate to have to beat it into you. Whipping’s not really my thing.” He tickles me, hands that minutes ago guided me through my orgasm moving over my ribs, bringing me to a fit of giggles. He chuckles as I squirm and try to wriggle away from him.

His hands change from tormenting to soothing. Slowly, we relax together and I drift, surrounded by his warmth and the tangy smell of our sex.

*

A fizzing noise wakes me. I crack open an eye, wince it shut when brightness explodes into my brain. Is it daytime already? My head feels thick and fuzzy. And my mouth tastes like the inside of a sock. Bleh. Did I really have three beers? I should know better.

“You awake, Ker?” Bull’s deep rumble.

“No.” I grope for a pillow and when I find one, pull it over my head. Mistake. A steel-drum band immediately strikes up a painful beat between my temples.

Bull chuckles. “When you decide you’re awake, here’s somethin’ that’ll help.” A clink of glass against wood. I lift the pillow a crack and see him set a bubbling glass on the nightstand.

“Oh, I definitely love you.” I hump my way across the bed, moving as few of my protesting muscles as possible, until I can reach the glass.

The medicated water sizzles up my nose when I drink too fast, but it washes the linty feeling out of my mouth and throat. I sink back into the pillows, cradling the glass against my chest. The pounding in my temples begins to subside. With each sip I feel more human. “Ooo, that’s better.”

The bed creaks as Bull’s weight lifts off the mattress. He moves toward the kitchen, humming something.

“What is that?” I ask. It’s not something I’ve heard him play or sing in the shower.

“I like to fuck an’ I have big balls,” he answers, over the metallic clatter of pans.

I sputter into my water. “What?”

Bull laughs, a wonderful, rich, masculine sound. “Somethin’ I made up. Seemed t’fit this mornin’.”

I can’t argue with that. I nurse the medicine, letting it wash away my headache while Bull rattles around in the kitchen. When I reach the bottom of the glass, I set it aside, stretch, and creakingly make my way out of bed. One of Bull’s black t-shirts is the first thing I find in the jumble of clothes on the floor and I pull it on. I haven’t worn his clothes since my own arrived, but this morning it feels right. I want him all around me this morning.

“There’s somethin’ deeply sexy about seeing you in my shirt th’ morning after,” he says.

I look up and find him watching me. His eyes roam slowly. Up my bare legs. Over what the t-shirt outlines. Lingering on the peaks of my nipples, clearly visible under the soft cloth.

He grins. “Think I’ll have you for desert.” He pours readi-eggs into a pan with a hot sizzle.

His deep voice shoots a thrill through me. He could read assembly instructions and it would get me hot. “Yes, please.”

Bull snorts. “You’re gonna have to be patient. Or satisfied with somethin’ other than dick this mornin’. I’m too sore t’even think about it. I think we did it seven times yesterday. Ain’t you sore?”

I nod. I am. I don’t care.

“You’re a nympho,” he says, but he grins.

“You’ve made me into one.” I pad across the white-washed permacrete floor to join him at the cooktop. “Are you making me breakfast?”

“Yeah.” The back of his neck flushes and I stretch up to kiss it. I love how he does these little things for me. Things a bottom should be doing for him. And I love how it embarrasses him when I point out the role-reversal.

“You’re makin’ the sausages, though,” he says.

With a nod, I move around him, narrowly avoiding cracking my hip on the edge of the dining table. Everything that’s not exercise equipment is squeezed into the smallest possible space in Bull’s apartment. The same rule holds true in the fridge, where beer takes up an entire shelf. The rest of the fridge is crammed with food, most of which has appeared since I moved in. I don’t think Bull ate here often when he was on his own. I locate a twist of soyu sausages, extricating them from under a bag of peppamatas that the greengrocer down the street somehow manages to import from the acid-rain-free East Union, despite the trade embargo. On second thought, I pull out the bag of peppamatas, thinking of how nicely they’ll fry up with the sausages.

Mmm, greasy food. Nothing better for a hangover. Except maybe sex with Bull. That could cure any ill.

Bull tips the scrambled eggs onto a plate and offers me the pan. I splash a little oil into it and the hot pan spits, spotting his shirt.

“Ooops.”

“You wanna apron?”

“You have one?” I ask as I add the sausages and peppamatas. I can’t see him owning an apron. Except maybe a black leather apron.

“No. You do, though. With that French maid outfit.”

I giggle. I wore a French maid costume the first night I came to Barzarre, the first night I met Bull. When I was still searching and confused and miserable. And when I didn’t know anything about kink other than what I’d seen in a shop window on my first foray into the Zone. “That was rented. And I’m surprised you remember it.”

“Remember it?” Bull leans against the counter next to me and crosses his arms over his chest, staring into the middle distance with a fond smile. “I’ll never forget it. Gave me jerk-off material for months.”

I lift an eyebrow at him. “It did?”

“Too fuckin’ right.”

“I could, um, rent it again.”

Bull grins. He pushes away from the counter and moves around behind me. His warm, hard arms slide around my waist. He pulls me back against his chest and stomach; my body nestles into each plane and curve. I love the way our bodies fit together. My eyes drift closed and only the hiss and crackle of the sausages in the pan pull me back to what I’m doing. I turn the sausages over before they burn.

“That’s somethin’ I been meanin’ to ask you,” he says. “I know you’re not really into the party scene—”

I have to keep my eyes on our breakfast, to keep it from burning, but I wish I could turn around and see his expression. “What makes you think I’m not into the party scene?”

“Never seen you at a party.”

“At a bondage party? No one’s ever invited me.”

“Oh.” He shifts his weight, hugs me a little more tightly. “You wanna go?”

I start to say _yes_. But then something Jere told me about parties comes back to me. The reason he and Viv didn’t take me to any. “Am I going with you or are we swinging?”

“You’re definitely with me.” His arms tighten. “I don’t share. Is that what you were thinkin’?”

I shrug, wishing again that I could see his face. Bull’s eyes tell me so much. Things neither he nor anyone else will say aloud. “I don’t know. I’ve never been to one. I’ve just heard that sometimes Masters swap their subs around. I don’t—” I shake my head. I can’t imagine being with anyone but Bull now and the idea of him being with another sub makes my still-tender head pound. “I don’t think I could do that.”

He rubs his cheek against my hair. “I don’t swap and I don’t share. Anyone asks for you and th’ answer’s _no_. They ask twice and we go home. Only reason I even mentioned it was ‘cause a that French maid outfit.” His hands shift, fingers walking my t-shirt up over my hips. He brushes the silk of his boxer shorts, the heat of his skin underneath, against my bare ass. “Thought we could do a scene.”

A _scene?_ I spoon the sausages and golden-fried, wrinkly-skinned peppamatas onto our plates and tap off the cooktop before I turn in his arms.

“What’s a scene?” I ask suspiciously. I have an idea, from the _scenes_ Marcus and Viv staged with me. Some of those scenes left me with scars. I’m not sure if a party scene is the same thing, but I’m going to be pretty goddamn sure before I agree to do one. Only the knowledge that Bull isn’t Marcus or Viv keeps this conversation from turning scary.

He takes each plate from me and sets them down on the table. Turning back to me, he stands solidly, his bulk blocking my way. “Ker, this stuff is supposed to be fun. I don’t mind negotiatin’ each point with you, but I think we gotta change some of your basic assumptions.”

I grimace. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked. It was a stupid question.”

“No it wasn’t. An’ I don’t mind you askin’. I mind you lookin’ like I’ve kicked your dog—”

“I don’t—!”

“Yeah, you do. Anytime I suggest somethin’ outside the little double-p comfort zone we got goin’, you balk. I had to talk you into lettin’ me go down on you yesterday. Look, it’s okay. If I was walkin’ around with stripes on my back an’ a brand on my hip that I didn’t ask for, I’d probably negotiate with my top pretty fuckin’ carefully, too. But you gotta trust me, at least a little, or this ain’t gonna work.”

“I do trust you! God, Bull, I trust you more than anyone I’ve ever known.”

“That’s a sad fuckin’ statement.” He sighs and rubs the back of his neck. “Let’s try this again. I’d like to take you to a party ‘cause I think it’d be fun. You were sayin’ you felt like you belonged last night, when we were at the Cage. I think you’d feel that way at a party, too. An’ if you’re okay with it, we could do a scene. A scene can be anythin’. Doesn’t have to be sex. Could be somethin’ else. I was thinkin’ we could rent that French maid outfit an’ do somethin’ with that. Maybe spankin’, if you’d get off on that.”

My head spins. I would definitely get off on that. It was my first kinky fantasy. Sparked by walking past the costume shop where I eventually rented the French maid costume. There was a holo tableaux in the window of a woman in frilly lace and black silk pinned down on a table while a leather-clad master stood over her, hand raised. That tableaux got me so hot I ditched the acquaintance I was window-shopping with, ran to the nearest public lav and had my first real orgasm. I feel a rush of wetness between my legs at the memory.

Bull chuckles. “That’s better. That’s the glazed look I know an’ love. C’mon, let’s eat.”

He leads me to the table and pulls me into his lap as he sits down. I watch him expectantly, waiting for him to tell me the rules, but he shakes his head. “You can feed yourself,” he grunts. “Feedin’ you’s too much like foreplay for how fuckin’ sore I am this morning.”

He chuckles at my pout.

The sausages, swimming in their own grease, are calling too loudly for me to object for long. I take several bites, chew blissfully, before I ask, “Bull, do people have full sex during these scenes?” I’m not sure I could stand for him to spank me and then not fuck me. But I’m not sure I want him to fuck me in a room full of strangers, either.

“Yup.”

“In front of everyone?”

“Yeah, but people are usually circulatin’ around. It’s not like everyone’s crowded into one room watchin’ one scene. Not at the bigger parties, anyway. I wouldn’t take you to a small party. They usually end up as orgies.”

“Oh.” My eyes widen. I hadn’t thought of that. “Have you gone to a lot of parties?”

“Nope,” Bull mumbles, his own mouth full. “Voyeurism doesn’t do much for me. ‘Specially when I don’t have anythin’ t’come home to. Exhibitionism, on the other hand, mmm, that’s another story.”

As the idea takes hold, my imagination takes over, building a mental vid of Bull holding me down in front of a crowd of onlookers while he spanks me and then pushes up tight against my reddened, stinging ass and fucks me. I get so excited I feel faint.

I sway on Bull’s lap. His hand closes on my hip. “Kerey, stop that. Or I really will spank you.”

I giggle so hard I choke on a sausage.

After Bull thumps me on the back, he sits back in the chair with a sigh. “Looks like I’m gonna have t’ thank Jello. Fuck, I hate doin’ that.”

I twist around to stare at him incredulously. “Why?”

“‘Cause I’m pissed at him for lettin’ that blood-suckin’ bitch have at him again and if I don’t act pissed at him for a coupla days, he gets the wrong idea—”

“No, _why_ are you thanking him?”

Bull chuckles. “It was him walkin’ in on us yesterday that gave me the idea.”

“Oh . . . I see. Wait, he won’t be there, will he? I mean, it won’t be in front of anyone I know, will it?”

“Probably not. If you go to enough parties, you’ll get to know the regulars. Mosta the bar staff don’t travel in that circuit, though. Timing’s all wrong. Parties’re usually when we’re workin’. I’d take a night off, if you wanted to go to one.”

I smile. “I would. I’d like to go.”

“All right.” His voice deepens and I know I’ve pleased him by agreeing. _I’m_ pleased I’ve agreed. “I’ll ask around,” he says. “Used to be a regular party on Thursday nights out on the Point. Good Host, too.”

“What’s a Host?” I ask around a bite of egg.

“Someone who coordinates the party. Makes sure it all runs smoothly. Keeps everythin’ safe, sane and consensual. You know, the three ‘s’es of kink.”

I shake my head. I’ve never heard the phrase. And my explorations into the world of kink have been anything but safe, sane and consensual.

“Yeah, well, that’s the theory, anyway,” Bull says. “Don’t worry. No matter how wild the party gets, I won’t let anythin’ happen to you.”

I glance over my shoulder at him and smile. I believe him. And I trust him. “Should I rent the French maid outfit for Thursday?”

“Yeah . . . or maybe you’d just better buy it. It might not be in any state to return after a party. Even if we don’t end up doin’ a scene, I can think of some uses for it.”

So can I. I wriggle at the thought of dressing up for him. I can’t help it. Bull groans and pushes me forward onto his knees. “Kerey, you’re killin’ me. I can’t remember ever bein’ this sore. Not even after cock ‘n’ ball torture.”

I twist around on his knee to look at him. “I thought that was for subs.”

Bull draws me back into his lap. He chews for a moment, then says, “Most tops start as bottoms. I’ve taken my turn. An’ before you ask, it hurt like fuck and we’re not doin’ it.”

“I wasn’t going to ask!” I protest, even though I was. He knows me too well.

“Uh-huh. Anyway, stop rubbin’ your ass up against me.” He finishes his sausage and stretches. “What’re you doin’ this afternoon?”

“Well, if you won’t come back to bed . . .” I sigh longingly. He pokes me in the ribs. Giggling, I continue, “I need to finish up Cee and Lou’s accounts. I didn’t get very far on them last night.” The memory of Piers’ call kills my giggles and I concentrate on my almost-empty plate so Bull doesn’t see my frown.

“How long’s that gonna take you?”

I shrug. “An hour. Maybe two.”

“Yeah? That could work out real well. I gotta do inventory today an’ if you’d help me, I’d have time to watch the match, too.”

I nod enthusiastically. He hasn’t asked me to help with the club before, and I haven’t offered because I haven’t wanted to push, to insert myself into spaces in his life where I’m not welcome. His invitation warms me right down to my toes. I wriggle in his lap before I can stop myself.

“Off!” Bull barks.

I slide off his lap quickly and begin to apologize. “I didn’t mean to do that! I’m sorry—”

Shaking his head, he rises, pulls me to him and silences my apology with a deep kiss. When he finally breaks the kiss, he looks down at me, his eyes glowing like midnight suns. He wipes sausage grease off my lower lip with his thumb and grins at me. “For that, you get to do the dishes.”

“Yes, master,” I say, reverting into flippancy because the sex last night and him inviting me to a party and his kisses and that huge grin make me feel so warm inside that I’m dangerously close to doing something stupid. Saying something I’ve been dancing around. Something I’m not quite ready to say yet. Something I might need him to say first.

He chuckles and kisses my nose before he moves away, circling a butterfly press machine on his way to the couch.

I turn to the sink, trying to tamp down my feelings to a manageable level.

I shake myself. I told Cee that no one could feel this intensely about someone else all the time and survive, and here I am, so overwhelmed by good sex and a little morning-after play that I can’t even wash a couple of dishes. I tap the middle faucet on the sink for hot, soapy water and hold my hand against the sensor to indicate the fill level. I briefly miss the autowash I left behind at my old apartment, and as I do, I realize this is the first time I’ve done the dishes since I moved in with Bull.

I glance over my shoulder and watch his broad back. He usually washes the dishes. And the clothes. And tidies up to the degree that both of us are comfortable with. A crawler does the heavy-duty cleaning, but only when one of us remembers to turn it on. All I’ve really done is cook, and only occasionally, since we usually go out to eat. I really have been sponging off him.

I shake myself again. From now on I’ll offer to do half of the household chores. I don’t want Bull to treat me like a guest. I want to belong here.

I collect the dirty dishes while the tap runs.

*

“Bull, there’s someone here to see Kerey.”

Pink’s slightly rusty mechanical tones over the intercom make me jump, jerking back out of the deep freezer I’m dangling in, helping Bull double-check his inventory, so fast I bang my head on the freezer’s steel lip.

I sit down on the floor next to the freezer, rubbing the back of my head. Bull looks up from the palmtop he’s logging inventory tallies onto and glares at the little black grill on the permacrete wall from which Pink’s voice issues.

“We’re busy,” Bull growls. “Who is it?”

The intercom transmits a muffled conversation while I rub my head. “I lost count,” I tell Bull ruefully.

Bull shakes his head. “So much for your gift with numbers. I’ll have to tell Lou and Cee.” He grins. “How the mighty have fallen.”

I stick my tongue out at him. “I got their return in before the deadline. They’ll worship me forever. You could try a little of that.”

“Worshippin’ you? Think you got that backwards. Ain’t you supposed to be worshippin’ right here?” He points at his groin with the stylus.

“Is that an invitation?” I climb to my knees and reach for his pants.

Bull chuckles and bats at my hands with the palmtop. “Get away.”

I hook my fingers in the waistband of his leather pants and begin working the closure with my thumbs.

“Ow!” he protests. “Stop that. I told you I’m too sore.” He tries to twist away, but I cling to the waistband of his pants and manage to pop open the top closure. “They’re gonna fall off if you keep fuckin’ with ‘em.”

“Don’t worry, master. I’ll be very gentle.” We both know that’s a lie. My technique is vigorous and Bull loves it that way. When he swats at my hands again, I add, “Oh, stop being such a pussy, master.”

Bull’s roar of laughter is punctuated by Pink’s rasp. “This fucker won’t tell me his name, but he says he’s her boss.”

Bull and I freeze. Then we jerk apart like guilty teenagers. He turns away from me while he refastens his pants. I rise slowly, brushing dust off my knees.

When Bull turns back to me, his mouth is drawn into a tight, white line. His nostrils flare. “She’ll be right up,” Bull says to the intercom.

“Bull, I—” I begin, but trail off when I realize I have no idea of what to say.

“Yeah?” His voice is low, with a hard edge to it. It sounds like he’s trying to keep it neutral, and failing.

“I just – I just want you to know that I don’t know why Piers is here. I didn’t invite him. I didn’t ask him to come find me.” Fuck, I should have told Bull about the second call. Why didn’t I? I’ve had a million chances since last night.

Bull nods. His expression doesn’t change, and I don’t think he believes me. “Want me to come up with you?”

“Yes, please, absolutely.” I hold my hand out to him and relief washes through me when he takes it.

He holds my hand, his body warm and reassuringly solid beside mine, while we ride up in the lift in silence. Everything feels fragmentary, illusory. The idea of Piers coming all the way to the Zone to find me is so far out of the natural order, so strange, that it feels like the entire world has been turned on its ear. I don’t understand why he’s here. What does he want? I didn’t think I’d hear from him again, or if I did it would be a couple of messages on the holo that I could ignore. Why has he come all this way in person?

The club floor is silent and dark when we reach it. A glitter of sunlight filters in from the vestibule. Pink’s hard-edged shadow angles across the floor from where he stands in the doorway, blocking the entrance into the club. I can’t see anything beyond the mech’s titanium bulk until we reach the vestibule and Pink rolls back a little.

Outside the club’s front door, my POS-suited ex-boss stands, looking down the street. His expression underneath the suit’s visor is slightly-disdainful, slightly-fearful, as though he expects something much worse than a few Monday-afternoon Zone shoppers to hurtle down the sidewalk at him.

I glance at Bull, standing solidly beside me, half in shadow. The filtered sunlight gleams on his dark gold skin, highlighting the huge muscles of his bare arms. He catches me looking at him and the corner of his mouth tilts. An attempt at a grin. But I can feel his tension. It shimmers around him like summer heat off permacrete. I shift in my boots, not knowing what to say to relieve that tension. I’m pretty fucking tense myself. I lean a little closer to him and Bull reaches out and rubs his hand up and down my back.

I try to smile as I turn back to my uninvited guest. It probably comes out more like a grimace, but it’s the best I can manage. “Piers,” I say. “What can I do for you?”

Piers jumps at the sound of my voice. He swings his head around and peers into the dim vestibule. His eyes are shaded by the POS-suit’s tinted visor, but I can feel them scrabble over me. I realize in a flash how I must look to him. I haven’t brushed my hair today. I probably still have my black eye-makeup on from partying last night, since I haven’t taken it off and it’s the perma-set kind that requires makeup remover, or a plasma blaster, to get off. In a concession to the basement’s chill, I replaced Bull’s grease-spotted t-shirt with a gray pull-over and a pair of old dance pants that I don’t mind getting dirty. The cropped pull-over and hip-slung pants bare my stomach, and the knotwork holotat that circles my navel. I don’t think Piers has ever seen my tattoo before. It’s not exactly something that would be in my HR file.

“Angela? Is that you?” he asks.

I nod.

Piers angles his head toward Pink’s looming bulk. “This thing said there wasn’t any Angela here.”

“I don’t go by that name here,” I say, carefully not telling him my club name. “I see you managed to find me anyway. What can I do for you?”

“I, uh—” His head turns a fraction, and I know he’s seen Bull. Piers steps forward, carefully around Pink, and holds out his hand. “I’m Piers Le Vasseur.”

The testosterone level in the vestibule rockets up so high I can almost taste it. Bitingly acidic, like cheap wine. Piers locks eyes with Bull, completely ignoring me, and the question I’ve asked, twice. Men. “Thanks, Piers,” I mutter, disgusted.

Bull glances at me, and he actually grins, before he reaches out and shakes Pier’s hand. Hard. “Bull,” he says.

Piers’s head goes to the side, like he’s examining a curiosity, or a stain. “I didn’t quite catch that.”

“Didn’t you?” Bull shrugs, but doesn’t offer his name again. Point to him.

“Piers, what can I do for you?” Maybe he’ll answer me if I ask again. Third time lucky.

“I, uh, I was hoping we could talk. When we spoke last night—” His visor shifts fractionally, and I can tell he’s hoping Bull doesn’t know about the call. Goddamn him. I should have remembered that, despite his twitchiness, Piers has enough political savvy to swim with the sharks. Bull doesn’t react, not even a flinch, but I can tell he’s bleeding inside. Fuck, why didn’t I tell him? “—we got off on the wrong track. I wanted to straighten that out.”

I roll my eyes. “There’s nothing more to say, Piers. I appreciate your concern, but as you can see, I’m fine.”

“Are you?” Piers asks, and the snideness of his tone makes me bristle.

“Yes,” I say firmly. “I am.”

Piers crosses his gloved hands. It’s a subtle gesture, but I know what he’s doing. He’s reaching for that damn ring. “Well,” he says, recovering. “I thought maybe we could talk . . . alone.”

I don’t know what to do. Glancing at Bull will make me look weak, like I need his permission to even step outside. Which I do, but not in the way Piers thinks. I want Bull to trust me enough to be okay with this. But I know he doesn’t. Not after last Sunday. Shit, shit, shit.

The two men are silent. Waiting for me. I want desperately for Bull to say something. Give me a sign. But he doesn’t. “I don’t see the point,” I say finally. “But since you’ve come all this way, I suppose we could go for a cup of coffee.” Inspiration strikes. “Bull, could I borrow your jacket?”

With my request as cover, I can turn my head and look up at him. He’s watching me, eyes shadowed, face closed. “Sure,” he says. There’s no warmth in his tone, and I’m not sure if the gesture has reached him. “I’ll get it for you.”

I open my mouth to say I’ll come with him, but he’s already striding off towards the lift. I’d have to run to catch up with him. And then I’d really look like his puppy. Damn it.

“So,” I say to Piers, making conversation to fill the awkward ensuing silence. “How is everything at the office?”

“That’s something we need to talk about,” Piers responds. He’s not looking at me. His visored head follows Bull. Just like Lana at the club last night. Sudden irritation flushes me.

“Hello?” I snap my fingers in front of his visor. “Are you here to see me, or Bull? ‘Cause I’m sure he’d be happy to let you buy him a cup of coffee.”

Piers starts and the visor swivels back towards me. “Oh, uh, sorry, Angie.” He shakes himself, like a vulture settling its feathers. “You seem . . . hostile. Are you sure everything’s okay?”

“Yes, everything’s fine. What’s not fine is you showing up here unexpected and uninvited. Would you like to explain that?”

I can’t see Piers’s eyes under the tinted visor, but I can guess he’s frowning. “I told you last night I’m concerned about you. It’s just not _normal_ to disappear like this. To someplace like this.” He gives a little sniff. Disdain. He’s probably never been in a club before, much less a club in the Zone. “What’s wrong with you, Angie? What’s going on?”

I bite back a response that would only bewilder him. I feel like we don’t even speak the same language anymore. The things I need and the choices I’ve made are so far outside anything he can understand, there’s no common tongue in which I can communicate them. I shake my head.

“How’s Shantale?” I ask instead. Our eDub-loving receptionist was the only person at the office I felt I could talk to about anything even remotely real. And even then it was only about music. She’d have turned whiter than Piers if I’d told her that I’d left the two dubfests we’d gone to together to get tied up and whipped and fucked in the ass by my dominatrix.

“Who?”

I can’t see much of his expression, so I don’t know if he’s kidding or if he really doesn’t know who Shantale is. It’s possible he doesn’t. I’ve never seen him interface with any of the support staff. Except by vmail. If I hadn’t reported directly to him, he probably wouldn’t have known who I was, either.

“Never mind.”

“Everyone at the office is very concerned about you,” Piers says.

I glance at the lift to hide my disbelief. Most of my ex-co-workers probably haven’t even noticed I’m gone. Where the fuck is Bull? What’s taking him so long?

The silence stretches, horribly. Just as I’m sure I’m going to have to say something to fill it, the black door set into the club’s black wall snicks open and Bull steps through, his leather jacket slung over one massive shoulder. Thank God.

At Bull’s return, Piers pulls himself up to his full height, sucks in his slight desk-jockey paunch. He looks scrawny, undernourished, compared to Bull. I forget how big Bull is until I see him next to someone like Piers.

“Here you go.” Bull holds out the jacket for me. I slide my arms through the sleeves and cuddle it around me, wishing it was Bull’s warm arms, his firm chest.

“Thanks.” I smile up at him. “I’ll be back soon. We can finish up that inventory.”

Bull’s eyes, narrowed and dark, sweep me. “Yeah. No rush.”

He nods once at Piers and turns back toward the lifts.

I watch him go. Why didn’t he say more? And why didn’t he kiss me goodbye? He always kisses me goodbye. I rub my lower lip forlornly.

When the lift swallows Bull, I turn back to Piers.

“Okay,” I say. “Let’s go.”

“What about your POS suit?”

I lift my face to the bright afternoon sunlight filtering in through the front door. “Think I’ll live a little,” I say with a smile. “This way.”

I’m sure under the visor Piers’s eyebrows have rocketed nearly to his receding hairline. But I ignore his surprise and lead the way out of the club. As I pass Pink, the big mech holds out one four-fingered robotic hands. I slap my hand across his, looking like I’m giving him five, but I’m really passing the bio-chip in my thumb over the security sensor in his palm. The gesture will bring his internal tracking system online. Wherever I go within the six-block radius of the Zone, he’ll be able to find me. One of the security systems Bull put in place after I got lost.

Today, though, I know where I’m going. Left out of Barzarre and a block north to Dinerz, the dining car turned coffee-shop that Bull and I like. Piers trails me silently, his visor flicking left and right, as though he’s waiting for something to spring out of the permacrete jungle and pounce on him. I shake my head and hold open the diner’s rusting, hinged door for him.

“Hey, Jin. Two coffees, please,” I say to the waitress lounging behind the diner’s formica countertop. She lifts her head, a sweep of spiked black hair, from a flexi spread on the counter that shows a news feed. The glow from the flexi glitters on a couple of new piercings along her jaw. Blue and green barbells. They match the holotattoo of blue and green waves that rise in white-capped ranks up her throat. “I like the new piercings.”

I hear Piers’s breath hiss.

“Thanks, Kerey,” Jin answers, her voice as sweet and wholesome as her pin-striped uniform. Candy pink today. “Here you go.”

She pours the drinks expertly and passes them across the counter. Coffees in hand, I lead Piers to a booth by the window. The diner’s empty, so we could sit anywhere, but this is the booth Bull likes, near the door, by the window. I circle around to the far seat, where Bull usually sits. I want the ghost of his presence around me while I face Piers.

Piers doesn’t remove his POS suit – he’s probably as afraid of the diner’s environment as he is of outside – but he pushes back his visor and strips off his gloves. His right hand immediately goes to the ring and begins working it. Building up to a full twitch.

“Thank you for coming out with me,” Piers says. He’s probably trying for gracious. It comes off snide. “I hope I haven’t caused any trouble. Your friend didn’t seem to want to let you go.”

The snideness spurs me to say, “Bull’s my lover, and you interrupted us.” I smile at the resulting shock on his face. “So, what did you want to talk about?”

Ring. Hair. Lip. I squeeze my eyes shut. If I have to sit and watch him do that over and over, I’m going to scream.

“I, uh, well—” He massages his lip while he tries to recover. His eyes flick left and right, not meeting mine, until he finally remembers his canned speech. “Let’s cut right to the chase, Angie. We’ve always been honest with each other.” His eyes flick over my face, registering my expression, which must be one of incredulity, and then skitter away. “I’ve come down here in the hopes that I can convince you to come back. The department needs you. You’re an integral member of the team, and it’s just not the same without you. I’ve been authorized to offer you a very generous package. Increased pay. Apartment upgrade. Two more vacation days. But this shouldn’t be about that. I’m hoping you’ll come back because it’s the right thing to do. Leaving the way you did . . . it wasn’t right.” He gives me his best art-of-the-deal seminar smile. “I’m betting that now that you’ve had some time to think about it, you agree. Am I right?”

I have to put my hand over my mouth to keep from laughing in his face. The _right thing_ to do? I’ve been trying to figure out the right thing for me my entire adult life. Eight years of confusion and frustration. Eight years of wondering why I’m different. Why the job and the clothes and the apartment and the eight days a year at a Corp Med resort and the hopelessly banal sex that seemed to satisfy everyone else just left me hollow. And now, finally, after all that searching and all the pain it took to get me here, with Bull, now that I have found the _right thing_ for me, he wants me to go back?

I shake my head slowly. “I’m sorry, Piers, but I really can’t see that happening.”

“You . . . what?” Ring. Hair. Lip. “Well, well, let’s not be so hasty now. Let’s think this through a bit. I want to make sure you understand all your options.”

I control a snort. He can’t begin to imagine my options. The image of Bull stretching me over a table, flipping up the tail of my French maid costume and spanking me makes me smile inside. “Piers, I told you that I thought us meeting would be a waste of time. _Leaving_ was the right thing for me. I’m happy where I am now. I’m not going back.”

Piers’s lip curls above his meditative fingers. “ _This_ makes you happy. Looking like this. Acting like this. Going under another name.” He eyes Bull’s jacket. His voice drops, thins. “Consorting with freaks. _This_ is what you want? I find that hard to believe. This isn’t you.”

“You don’t know the first thing about me,” I say tightly, trying to control my rising temper. I hate the way he uses the word “freak.” If he says it again, I’m going to slap him.

“We’ve worked side-by-side for six years, Angie! You’re my closest ally. How can you say that?” Genuine hurt registers on his face, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. His eyes remain steady on my face, and there’s a nasty, calculating light in them that makes goosebumps rise on my arms.

I take a sip of my coffee, trying to calm down, let my anger go cold, before I answer him. “My name’s not Angela, for starters. And if you call my friends ‘freaks’ one more time, I’m walking out of here without another word. You try to contact me or come to Barzarre again, and I’ll have you cubed for stalking. So watch what you say, Piers.”

He gapes at me. I feel a twinge of remorse at having lashed back at him so hard. I moderate my tone grudgingly before I continue, “I’m not coming back. End of discussion. Is there anything else you wanted to talk about?”

Ring. Hair. Lip.

Before I can stop myself, I reach across the table, grab his wrist and slam it onto the formica. “Stop that! God, Piers, that is the most fucking annoying habit I’ve ever seen. Haven’t you ever watched yourself in a mirror? What did you do at all those public speaking seminars, anyway?”

He withdraws his wrist from my grasp with wounded delicacy and tucks both hands into his lap, under the edge of the table. Probably cupping his balls. I pinch the bridge of my nose. My headache’s coming back.

“I don’t understand what’s happened to you,” he says slowly.

“No, I don’t suppose you do,” I respond.

“Your behavior is so strange, so erratic. I came down here to see for myself. But now that we’ve had this conversation, I think I have to recommend that you be evaluated. It’s for your own good. You’ll see. The psyche team is very good, Angie. They’ll help you figure it out it—”

I glare at him in furious disbelief. “You really haven’t gotten it, have you? I _do not_ work for you anymore. I’m a private citizen. You can’t recommend _shit_ for me. Goodbye, Piers.”

I begin to rise.

“I’ll make sure you never work anywhere again,” he says, low and nasty. “You’ll never get another job. Not in compliance. Not anywhere.”

I pause, bracing myself against the table. “What did you say?”

“I didn’t want it to come to this.” He rubs his lip, an abbreviated twitch. “I didn’t want to have to play this card. But if you refuse to see reason, I don’t see what choice I have. Either you come back voluntarily and have yourself evaluated, or I blacklist you. There are already some ugly allegations floating around. Pinning them on you wouldn’t be any problem. You’d never work again.”

I stare at him. The calculating light in his eyes has congealed into something frightening. Something frightened. And an answering light goes on in my head. Why he came all the way to the Zone to find me. Why he’s so desperate to have me come back. “Oh, God . . . I get it. What did you fuck up, Piers? Was it the SNC report? The 5-C filing? What?”

His eyes skitter away from mine.

“Tell me you moved Rochelle or Eppie into my job and you didn’t try to do it yourself.” When he won’t meet my eyes, I shake my head. “Have you even told anyone I’m gone? Or are you just pretending I’m on sick leave? It won’t work, Piers. I’m not coming back.” As I say it, warm certainty floods through me. Even if he makes good on his threats and costs me my license, I’m not going back. I’m finished with the straight world. I belong with Bull, in his world. I can’t straddle the line. I’ve made my choice.

I straighten and cross my arms over my chest in a creak of leather. The tightening of the jacket across my back feels like Bull’s arms closing around me. “You do what you think’s _right_ , Piers. Pin your screw-up on me if it saves your ass. But I’m not coming back to bail you out, and it won’t be so easy to find a scapegoat next time. So I suggest you use all those negotiating skills to get some more money out of the higher-ups and hire someone competent to replace me. Good luck.” I can’t keep the disgust out of my voice.

“Angie, wait—”

I shake my head firmly. “We’re done, Piers. And I meant what I said. I will have you cubed if you don’t leave me alone. Think of how _that_ would look on your HR record.”

“Angie, please!” He rises and takes a step after me. I retreat towards the counter. “Please, I’ve gone about this wrong. At least let us part friends.” He holds out his hand.

I back up to the counter, keeping my hands tucked firmly in my armpits. He threatened me. I’ve had enough threats to last the rest of my life. Viv’s final threat after she branded me still wakes me up shaking sometimes. I know who my friends are. And anyone who threatens me is _not_ my friend. “Goodbye, Piers. Jin, if he tries to follow me, call the CP.”

The waitress’s hand touches my shoulder, squeezes. “You got it.”

I edge out of the door, and realize why Bull likes sitting in that booth. Maybe he’s had to make a few quick exits from here himself. The walk back to Barzarre takes ten times longer than it should. I keep wanting to look over my shoulder. To see if Piers is following me. But I control the impulse, and the shivers that threaten to overwhelm me at the mental image of him swooping down the street after me like a buzzard. I focus on getting back, getting home. I want to curl up in Bull’s lap, put my arms around his neck, bury my face in that warm golden skin and tell him everything. About the call last night and Piers’s viciousness today and my realization that no matter what Piers does, it doesn’t matter because I’ve found the place I belong and I’m not going back.

And it’s that desire, not the fear of what’s behind me, that has me running the last few yards to the club and dashing inside. Pink greets me at the door, holds out his hand for me to swipe my bio-chip across his palm-sensor.

“Could you signal Dinerz and let Jin know I got back okay?” I ask the mech breathlessly.

Pink nods. “Done. Bull’s upstairs. He asked me to tell you if you came back.”

I’m in the lift before Pink’s words register. _If_ I came back? Did Bull think for one moment I wasn’t coming back? I slam the lift’s control to full, a futile gesture since the lift has one, creakingly slow, speed.

Finally, the lift grinds to a halt and I yank open the grates.

On the other side of the loft, Bull and Lou stand, their bodies silhouetted in front of the holoscreen, embracing. At the clang of the grates, they turn. Their arms fall away from each other.

Bewildered, I step slowly out of the lift and walk towards them, hugging Bull’s jacket around me. “Hey,” I say uncertainly. As I get closer I can see that Lou’s face is taut, pinched. Her eyes are red. “Is everything okay?”

Lou smiles, a brave smile that reminds me so much of Cecile’s that my heart gives a lurch. “Has something happened?” I ask.

Lou glances at Bull, but instead of looking back at me, she puts her hand over her eyes. Her shoulders begin to shake.

“Sit down, Ker,” Bull says softly.

I reach the back of the couch and grip it. “Why? What’s going on?”

Bull reaches out, gathers a handful of jacket, and steers me around the end of the couch. He pulls me to him, into those warm, firm arms. Where I wanted to be. But not like this, not when I can tell that something’s very, very wrong.

Bull drops his head to my ear. “Cee’s in the hospital. Lou found her. She ODed on poppers.”

I grab onto him. To keep myself from falling. “Oh, no!” I wail.

“Kerey,” Lou says, her low alto voice broken and roughened. “I know you and Cee had gotten really close . . . do you know what she was doing with poppers? Did she talk to you about it? Cee never did drugs . . .”

“Bull—” I bury my face in his shoulder as the tears begin and my breathing dissolves into hitching gasps. What can I tell her? That Cecile suspected she was cheating? That Cee and I talked about Marcus ODing on poppers? My head feels like it’s going to explode. Did Cee get the idea from our conversation?

“S’okay,” Bull murmurs comfortingly. He rubs his hands up and down my back, a sweet susurrus of leather. “It’s okay, Ker.”

“It’s not okay,” I cry.

And I was so wrapped up in my own little melodrama when she was trying to tell me her very real problems that I didn’t offer her what she needed. I should have said more, done more.

“I have to go,” Lou says. I hear the slide of skin on skin. Like she’s wiping her eyes. Or Bull’s patted her shoulder. “Cee’s parents are coming in on the bullet train. I have to go pick them up.”

“Want me t’go?” Bull offers.

“No. Thanks, Bull. I’ll call you later, if that’s okay.”

“Yeah, anytime. Lemme see you out. Ker, sit down.” Bull gently pushes me onto the couch and I huddle there, clutching his jacket and trying to warm the chill that seems to have sunk its teeth all the way into my bones.

Bull returns after what feels like hours of shivering silence. He sits down heavily next to me and puts his arms around me. I bury myself in him.

“You blamin’ yourself?” he asks.

“What?” How could he know?

“Lou doesn’t know, an’ I wasn’t gonna tell her. But you an’ I both know that less than twenty-four hours ago you an’ Cee were talkin’ about your ex ODin’ on poppers. Pretty big fuckin’ coincidence. An’ I know the way your mind works. Everythin’s about you. So I figure you’re startin’ to beat yourself up right about now. Cee did this to herself. Or she got unlucky. Whichever, it’s got nothin’ to do with you.”

I grind my wet face into his chest. “You don’t understand . . . Cee told me, she was afraid that Lou was having an affair. And I said I didn’t believe it. Because Lou always seemed to dote on her. But I should have listened. I should have said something . . . more. I should have reassured her somehow . . .”

Bull pushes his jacket off me and wraps me in his arms. “You think that’da made a difference? Lou _is_ havin’ an affair, Kerey. Been goin’ on for a coupla weeks. Ain’t the first time, either. Lou’s like a tom-cat. She sees somethin’ she likes and she’s gotta stray.”

“Oh, no!” I wail. Cecile was right, and I didn’t listen. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“’Cause it’s none of your business. An’ it wouldn’t a made any difference if you’d known. This ain’t about you. It’s between Lou and Cee.”

“Bu-bu-but you told me they were happy!”

Bull shrugs. “Cee knows about Lou’s thing for a bit on th’ side. Least she knew about the last one, ‘cause she’s the one who told me about it. She seemed okay with it. An’ they are happy otherwise. Best couple I’ve seen together.”

I nod tearily into his shoulder. I thought so, too. But inside, Cee must have been dying. Why else would she try the fake, all-too-short escape of poppers?

Bull strokes my hair, rubs his fingers against the back of my neck. “I’m sorry you came back t’ this, Ker. I’da broken it to you differently . . . I’m glad you came back, though.”

I lift my face so I can see his. His eyes are shuttered and dark, his expression tight. “Did you really think I wasn’t?” I ask.

His mouth twists ruefully and he doesn’t answer.

I put my face back down in his shoulder. “This is where I belong, Bull.”

His arms tighten around me. “Yeah?”

“Yes,” I say.

“No second thoughts?”

“No.” Not a single one. The idea of going back, of returning to the lies and the hiding and the shame, makes me feel sick and shivery.

A deep sigh. “Ker, I don’t wanna push you, ‘cause you don’t do too well when you’re pushed. But . . . I gotta know. I can’t do this again.”

“Wh-what can’t you do again?”

He strokes my head. Rubbing his face in my hair, he whispers, “Remember when I told you I didn’t want another pet? First night we got together?”

I nod again, trying to catch my breath, wondering where he’s going with this.

“I had one once. A real slave. For about a month. We hooked up at a private party. She wanted the works. Completely house-bound. No clothes. Slept on th’ floor when we weren’t fuckin’. Never up off her knees. The whole thing.”

He rubs his hand over my head again, kisses my temple. “I’d just opened Barzarre. I was workin’ every hour God sent. I had no time for a slave, an’ . . . I didn’t take good care of her. I’d come back from workin’ fourteen or fifteen hours at a stretch an’ fuck her an’ fall asleep. Some days I probably didn’t say more’n ten words to her.”

He takes a deep breath, exhales, and when he speaks again, his voice is so low it could be echoing up from underground. “One day I came back from a beer run and she was gone. Just gone. No message. Nothin’.”

My guts clench and I wrap my arms around his neck. “Oh, Bull—”

“I went outta my mind,” he says heavily. “I kept imagin’ the worst. That someone’d taken her an’ she was somewhere scared, hurtin’ or maybe even dead an’ I . . . I didn’t even know where to start lookin’ for her. I hadn’t asked her anythin’ about her people. Didn’t know where she lived. I called th’ CP, but I couldn’t even give ‘em her last name. Fuckin’ nightmare.”

He shakes his head. “Three days later, her sister called. Turns out she had a job and a family. Boyfriend, too. They were crazier than I was. She hadn’t given ‘em any warning before she disappeared. Just dropped outta sight. But she got tired of me ignorin’ her and finally called ‘em and asked ‘em t’come get her. Her sister called me ‘cause she figured I oughta know. So I wasn’t in doubt the way they’d been. I was so fuckin’ grateful for that call, I cried after she hung up.”

He’s silent for a moment and I don’t know what to say. I press my body against his, shower tiny kisses along his jaw.

“When I came back that day an’ you weren’t here . . . it was Stanzie all over again. I didn’t know where you’d gone. If you were okay. If you were comin’ back. What the fuck I’d done t’make you leave.” His arms tighten around me until I’m breathless. “An’ I didn’t know where t’look, Kerey. _Again_. Even though you’d been here for almost a week, I didn’t know who to call. Where t’start. I didn’t even know your full name. An’ then that jack-off calls an’ I realize I don’t know your name at all.”

“Oh, Bull.” I shake my head. “It’s not like that.”

“No?” Bull growls. “Feels pretty fuckin’ exactly like that. Two weeks together an’ I still don’t know a thing about you, _Kerey_. I been inside you every way I can think of but your buddy Piers still knows more about you than I do—”

I put a trembling hand over his mouth, needing to stop this before it gets any uglier. “My name’s Angharad Kerenza Dey. My family’s from upstate. My parents are divorced. My mother knows where I am. I haven’t spoken to my Dad in years, and I don’t have any brothers or sisters.” I take a deep breath, willing myself to go on. “Even if I did, I wouldn’t call them to rescue me. I _want_ to be here, Bull. I’m _not_ leaving, not unless you kick me out.”

Bull’s silent for a moment and I cling to him. Afraid that if I let go, he will kick me out, and never draw me back. Into this spot. Within the circle of his arms. Pressed against his body. Where I belong. “Please, Bull,” I whisper. “Don’t kick me out.”

He kisses my palm. A wet pressure. When I take my hand away, he says, “Angharad, huh?”

“If you call me that, I’ll kill you. I mean it.”

He chuckles. “Guess I wouldn’t want t’go by that, either.”

“You know, it’s not like you’ve told me your real name.”

“Yeah, I have.”

“ _Bull_?” I can’t keep the sarcasm out of my voice.

“It is. I had it changed. It’s what everyone’s always called me and I figured it fits.”

“Oh.” I feel a defensive flush creep up my neck. “How was I supposed to know?”

“Ask.” Bull shrugs. “That’s what people do when they wanna get t’know each other, Ker. You’re so fuckin’ careful to hide everythin’ about yourself that you never ask anythin’ about anyone else.”

“You don’t understand how it’s been for me—” I begin, but bite off my words when I hear the whine in my own voice.

“Yes, I do,” Bull says roughly. “I know exactly how it’s been for you. Feelin’ different all the time. Feelin’ like you’re a freak. You’re talkin’ to Freak Number One, here. Difference is, I never gave a fuck what anyone else thought. I never tried t’hide what I am. An’ people like me ‘ _causa_ it.”

“That’s not fair,” I choke. “You’re a man and you were born this way. When you’re a woman and you want something – when you need something – like what I need, everything changes. You’re a whore. A slut. Even if you’re so monogamous you might as well be married, it doesn’t matter. There’s still something _wrong_ with you. People don’t treat you the same. It’s like you’re not a person anymore. You’re reduced to this _thing_ that they can use and poke fun at . . .”

His arms tighten around me. “Ker—”

“When you’re a man . . . somehow it’s masculine or cool or something when you’re into kink. But when you’re a woman, it’s not okay . . . and it’s even worse if you’re a sub. It’s okay to be a dominatrix, because they’re tough, but tell anyone that you spent your weekend _being_ tied up and whipped and fucked in the ass . . .” I wipe tears off my cheeks.

Bull presses his lips against the top of my head. “Sorry, Ker. I didn’t think of it that way.”

“I haven’t been able to let anyone know me, Bull. I’ve been hiding who and what I am . . . for a really long time.”

“ _Kerey_ ,” he says my name – the name that he calls me, the name that’s who I am now – deep and soft, the way he does when he’s inside me. “No one’s gonna judge you. An’ if I hear anyone callin’ you a slut or a whore, I’ll tear ‘em a new one.”

I smile a little. The thought of Bull on the rampage warms the cold places inside me. “I’ve kind of been waiting for _you_ to call me those things. You know, when you talk dirty to me. Viv called me . . . well, you know what Viv called me.”

It’s burned into my hip in two-inch letters.

“Yeah, I know.” Bull runs a hand over my head, pushing my bangs back from my face. “I respect you too much t’call you anythin’ like that. Even when we’re playin’.”

I look up into those liquid dark eyes. “You do?”

“Yeah. You think I’d be with someone I didn’t respect?”

“I – I never thought about it.” And I haven’t. I haven’t examined too closely why Bull would want me to stay. If there’s anything for him beyond sex. But now that he’s said it, it fits together in my head. Why he doesn’t call me _slut_ or _whore_ when he’s talking dirty to me. Why even the wildest sex with him doesn’t leave me torn and aching and remorseful the next day. Why he does little things like making breakfast for me, and why those gestures touch me so much.

“Think about it,” he says, tucking my head back into his chest. I do, and as I do, my eyes begin to burn again. “An’ stop dwellin’ on things you can’t change.”

He means Cee, and even the thought of her brings back the tightness in my throat. “What are we going to do?” I ask in a whisper.

“If either of ‘em need anything, we’ll be there. Otherwise, we’re gonna leave ‘em to sort it out themselves.”

I lift my head to object, but then what he’s saying sinks in. It’s not about me. I nod and rub my face against the broad plane of his pectorals. “You’re right.”

Bull sighs and caresses the nape of my neck with warm, strong fingers. “Yeah, I am.”

He is. I understand. “I’d like to take Cee flowers. And maybe we could take Lou dinner or something. Hospitals . . . they’re not nice places.”

Bull kisses the top of my head. “Yeah, we could do that.”

We sit in silence for several moments, cuddling into each other’s warmth. Finally, Bull pushes me up off his lap. I stand uncertainly, unsure of his mood. “Sorry, Ker. Between your asshole boss and Lou, I’m never gonna get this fuckin’ inventory done.”

I twist my hands behind my back, feeling responsible for both interruptions. “I’ll help you.”

Bull rises and takes my hand. “You don’t mind?”

“No, I’d like to help. I’d like to, you know, be involved.”

Bull’s chin wrinkles as he considers this. “I didn’t want to ask you.”

And I didn’t want to insert myself where I wasn’t wanted. I smile shyly at him.

“C’mon.” He drapes his heavy arm around my shoulders and steers me towards the lift. “I can’t believe you went out like that.”

“Like what?” I glance down at myself, catch the tips of my black-and-blonde hair hanging over the cut-off, my exposed tattoo, the hip-slung dusty pants. “Oh.” I brush a hand self-consciously down my front. “I look a mess.”

“You look fuckin’ gorgeous. But you don’t look anythin’ like you did that day you came back. All buttoned down an’ covered up.” He ruffles my hair. “Your hair was screwed up so tight it looked like it was pullin’ your face off.”

I giggle. “It felt like it some days.”

“I thought your boss was gonna have a fit, seein’ you like this.”

“ _Ex_ -boss.”

“Yeah?”

As we reach the lift, I turn to look up at him. “Yes. I’m done with that life.”

He pulls down the gate and works the lever to get the lift moving. “Good.” He drapes his arm around me again. “You know what I been thinkin’ about while you been gone?” he asks.

I look up at him, surprised. I thought we’d finished this topic. “That I wasn’t coming back?”

“Other’n that.” Bull glances down at me and grins wickedly. “I was thinkin’ ‘bout how you looked when you were bent over the freezer.” He squeezes my ass. “Think it’s just about the right height.”

Familiar heat flushes me, tightens my stomach. “I thought you were too sore.”

“Plenty of ice down there.”

The thought of Bull icing himself so we can have sex in the basement has me giggling all the way down in the lift.


End file.
